A Contract By Any Other Name
by OrderlyAnarchist
Summary: Final Fantasy XIII Fangrai Witcher AU Fang is a witcher with a home, a sister, and her own cause to fight for. It sounds a whole lot better than being a witcher with a shattered fortress, a dead school, and no clients willing to pay a contract. When the High Sorcerer of Eden sets his sights on Vanille, she embarks on a contract of her own making. Nothing is so simple as it seems.
1. Trouble

_Thanks goes out to Duck, XalkXolc, Evelos, and my thesis advisor for reading this in advance and offering thoughts and opinions. You can find Evelos and all her wonderful work here on . If you haven't read Anomalies yet, you should. It's only the greatest work ever produced within this fandom (in my humble opinion)._

 _This should be a long ride, so buckle up._

* * *

Fang woke to the faint smell of smoke and the sound of distant screaming. She threw herself out of her bed, unmindful of the covers she tossed to the floor in the process, and assessed her immediate surroundings for the slightest hint of danger. She'd slept in the room enough to call it hers, and if any part of it was amiss there wasn't a chance she'd fail to spot it. She didn't waste more than a precious few seconds ensuring her immediate safety.

"Vanille!" she called out, the slightest hint of fear amplifying her voice. A single set of light footfalls just outside her room was reassuring her, and when Vanille's head poked through the door, framed by an unruly mess of red curls she clearly didn't have the time to tame, Fang felt some of the tension unwind from her body.

"Trouble," the other girl explained, her voice uncharacteristically cold, and Fang resisted the urge to sigh.

"There always is." She caught the underclothes Vanille threw her away without looking. "I'll get suited up," Fang said. "You pack up all the equipment you can. Just in case."

"I was sure I'd lost them this time," Vanille whispered as she turned to leave.

Fang didn't answer; there was nothing for her to say. When she was sure her sister was out of sight, she let her features twist into a snarl, unadulterated rage bubbling up from the pit of her stomach. There wouldn't be enough left of them to lose once she was through with them.

Familiar as the motions were, it was only a few brief minutes before Fang stood fully clad in the traditional armour of the Uridimmu Witcher school. _Probably the only set left,_ she thought morosely. Killing the arcanophobic idiots trying to smoke them out of their home grew more appealing with every passing moment. She slung her silver sword over her back and did a brief check to ensure her potions, oils, and decoctions were all organized in their appropriate sashes and pouches. As the final step of the ritualistic preparation, she removed her prized weapon, Kain's Lance, from its place on her overburdened rack of arms, and set about coating both ends with a heavy and potent dose of Hanged Man's Venom. She cast a mournful look over the rest of her collection, a diverse array of steel and silver swords, a variety of spears and lances, and even a Mahakaman greataxe. "I'll come back for you later. Promise." Then she left the room without sparing so much as another glance behind her.

Her heavy footfalls seemed to reverberate as she marched down the stairs, though not nearly enough to drown out the screaming and shouting of the village outside. "You ready Vanille?" She called out. She held her lance out at the ready, unwilling to risk even the slightest chance of being caught off guard.

"Just about!" Vanille replied. Fang could see her fiddling with several strange devices arrayed in the corner of the room before they vanished in a flash of blinding light.

"Fuck, Vanille!" Fang cursed, rubbing at her eyes. She'd been looking right at it. "Some warning next time!"

"Sorry!" Vanille squeaked. "I was in such a rush, and I didn't think you'd be looking at it."

It was reassuring to hear a bit of her sister's bubbly attitude return to her, even if Fang knew it was almost certainly a facade. There was something about Vanille's cheerful demeanour that always seemed to soothe the tension tugging at Fang's nerves.

"It's fine," Fang assured her. "Much as I'd love to, we don't have time for a lecture. Are you ready to move? Because we're moving."

"You have a plan?" Vanille asked.

Fang felt a hint of a genuine smile tug at her cheeks. After all this time traveling together, her sister still didn't know better than to ask that question.

"Something in that vein."

Vanille's gaze fell. "Fang no."

Fang's emerald eyes seemed to sparkle. "Too late."

Vanille hefted her binding rod, a strange sorcerer's staff that seemed built as much for physical combat as it was channeling arcane energies, with a sigh. "Just… try not to get us both killed."

Fang grinned. Then she kicked the front door open. The smoke wasn't near as bad as she'd feared it might be, although the sounds of terror and conflict were a great deal more oppressive out in the open. She brought two fingers to her lips in a shrill whistle, nodding appreciatively as the sound of galloping hooves appeared within a moment's notice. The jet black stallion reared to a halt in front of her, and as soon as he was back on four hooves Fang threw herself into the saddle, Vanille climbing up and taking a place behind her right after. "Bahamut!" Fang called out, urging the stallion forward towards the place where the noise of conflict was loudest. "Let's ride!"

As Bahamut tore through the streets, Fang let her eyes narrow. Men, women, and children alike were fleeing in the opposite direction, with naught but the clothes on their back and what few possessions they could carry. She slowed Bahamut's pace just a little to ensure he wouldn't accidentally trample them. She hadn't been here long, all things considered, but Oerba was the closest thing to home that Fang had known in decades. She and Vanille were accepted here. That acceptance was tentative at first, and likely only existed for the fact that none of the villagers felt strong enough to shoo them away. Now, however…

One of the fleeing men paused, waving his arms as he desperately tried to catch her gaze. "Master witcher!" He called out. "Witch hunters in the town square!"

"I'll take care of it," she assured him, briefly slowing Bahamut's pace to a trot. "Just make sure your family is safe." Then they were off again. Fang felt her simmering anger boil into white hot fury. They had honest to the gods friends here - a life here - and now the damned hunters were threatening to take that all away. Teachings be damned; she always fought her best when she was angry. She'd seen enough of the world in her travels to know good people usually didn't deserve their lot in life. It was the sad truth of a world where death could lurk in every shadow, but these… these were her people.

As Bahamut cleared the end of the narrow street and charged into the village square, Fang swept her gaze across the area, assessing the situation with a single sweeping gaze. The gathering hall was fully ablaze, and the homes of the village elders were similarly engulfed in fire. The flames hadn't spread far, but it would only be a matter of time before tongues of fire licked at the dangerously dry thatched roofs that covered so many of Oerba's buildings. Only a blind man could believe the fire was natural, and Fang was far from blind. She noted the presence of people, and her gaze quickly flicked across the evident perpetrators of the arson. Eight men and four women were spread across the square, each bearing arms of average make, and most were garbed in the telltale apparel of a witch hunter. Several individuals had been rounded up into a cluster between them, looking quite a bit worse for wear. One of the hunters was waving his weapon and jeering at them.

She felt it more than she saw it, as each one of their gazes turned away from their quarry to fixate on her as Bahamut slowed to a gentle trot.

"Vanille," Fang began, her tone a quiet calm utterly at odds with the rage boiling inside her. "Make sure those people get to safety-" she gestured at the people the witch hunters had rounded up - " then deal with the fire. I'll deal with our friends."

"Fang-"

"The sooner the flames are dealt with, the sooner you can help me," Fang said, cutting off her sister's protests. She swiftly dismounted Bahamut, withdrawing Kain's Lance from its resting place on her back. "Don't let Oerba go up in smoke."

Vanille cursed. "Fine. But if you die I'll never forgive you."

Fang laughed. It was an uncomfortable, feral sort of sound, and she relished the sight of several of the nearer witch hunters shifting uncomfortably. "If I died to these idiots, I wouldn't forgive myself."

One of the witch hunters had the gall to meet her approach halfway, the hunter's longsword gripped in a defensive stance. The deathgrip with which she clenched its hilt did not escape the witcher's notice, and she picked out three separate flaws in the hunter's guard before the woman could even bring herself to speak.

"Witcher," she said, and Fang could hear the way her voice reeked of hesitation. "We have no quarrel with you. Surrender the witch and we'll be on our way."

Fang raised an eyebrow. "That so?" she asked. The witch hunter looked stiff bordering on frozen. If she struck low, the woman didn't have a chance of knocking her blade aside.

The witch hunter offered her only a tight nod in reply. The motion was the flame to the fuse that brought all of Fang's fury to a head. She snarled as her lance lashed out, a low thrust that avoided the witch hunter's lousy guard and buried itself in the woman's stomach. She let out a startled gasp as her mouth began to open and close in a series of futile gestures. Fang was close enough to watch as the grievous wound and potent venom on her blade took their toll, and the flicker of life began to fade from the woman's eyes.

"You've quarrelled with my home and you've quarrelled with my sister," Fang growled. "You better believe you have a quarrel with me." She wrenched her weapon out of the hunter's stomach, paying no heed to the body as it crashed to the ground, the hunter's last agonized seconds of life bleeding away into the dirt. The other hunters had already surged into motion, several creeping towards her from the front as the smarter ones in the group looked to wrap around and attack her from behind.

Fang planted her feet in a wide stance as she twirled her lance with a flourish, bringing it to rest in a horizontal guard protecting her chest. "You coming or not?" She taunted. "I've got your fight right here!"

A pair of the hunters elected to charge her, and Fang allowed herself to grin. She always did have a knack for provoking people. The first of the pair was a huge man, standing closer to seven feet tall than six, and brandishing a spiked and oversized steel mace. He swung it forward with a bellow, intent on crushing her skull in a single blow. Fang deftly stepped to the side and let the weapon sail past her, crashing down towards the earth. The extended swing overbalanced the hunter and he stumbled forward with the momentum of his mace, trying to regain control of his heavy implement. Fang scoffed before viciously kicking him in the side of his knee. An awful cracking sound and a broken cry heralded his inelegant collapse to the earth. His partner seemed to possess more in the way of sense, and approached her more cautiously, a shield held up between them as he kept his own short sword held off to the side. She planted the blade of her lance firmly in the back of the downed mace-wielder and savoured the sharp exhale of breath leaving his body. She watched the fleeting flash of different emotions across the shieldbearer's face - anger, then fear, then anger again. She seized the opportunity.

"You planning on doing anything with that shield, or can I keep killin' your friends?" It did the trick, and the witch hunter's expression morphed from one of anger to indignant fury, his previous restraint forgotten as he slashed at her with his sword. Fang caught the blow with the haft of her lance, the steel connecting with a resonating clang. She forced the blade down and away before twirling the weapon around, striking hard at the hunter's left side. He caught the blow with his shield - barely - but she saw him grimace at the force of it. The deep gash in the wood left behind by her weapon's ruthless edge was a testament to the power behind her swings. Fang sensed motion behind her and spun to face it, ducking to avoid the high slash of a broadsword aimed at her neck. The hunters flanking her had finally worked up their nerve. A quick sign of Quen provided Fang an insurance policy against any glancing blows, and she abandoned her defensive posture. A blast of Aard left two of the Hunter's sprawled in the dirt as a third struggled to keep her feet. Fang was on them in an instant. The ruthless edge of her lance cut the throat of the first man like a drowner cut through water, and she didn't spare him another thought as she left him to choke on his own blood. The second was only just finding his feet when Fang kicked him back to the ground. A lazy twirl of her lance knocked his sword out of his hand, and she'd just put her throat on his boot to crush his windpipe when she heard a choked whisper: "I yield".

The fury coursing through her veins screamed at her to end him anyway, but the part of her that knew Vanille would never forgive her if she did won out. She removed her boot from his throat and kicked him the head hard, taking a small amount of satisfaction from the way the man's eyes rolled back as he blacked out. She didn't have time to worry about the woman she'd left reeling as she heard the shield bearer from before charge her with a howling cry.

She fought the urge to roll her eyes as she jabbed her lance behind her in the vague direction of the screaming. She heard the telltale scuffle of stumbling footfalls followed by a thump as he threw his weight to the side and fell to the ground, presumably to avoid impaling himself on the blade of her much longer weapon. If it wasn't also Vanille's life at stake, Fang might have taken a moment to laugh at the absurdity at all. Somehow, she was the last of the Uridimmu. Somehow, every last Witcher in her school had met their end. When this was the caliber of the hunters sent to kill her, it made her wonder if she really was the last of her kind. She had never been particularly popular amongst the others - maybe it was all an elaborate scheme to hide from her. It was easier to believe than the notion of these idiots striking down someone like Caius.

Her ears registered a muted twang, and Fang jerked to the side in such a way that the arrow fired in her direction broke on her shoulder plates rather than embedding itself in her neck. Forgetting the hunter with the shield, she blasted the woman who'd just regained her footing with another burst of aard then tore off in the direction of the archer. Though she'd never been known for her speed, the mutagens that warped her body ensured she was superhuman in every sense of the word; no ordinary man or woman could even dream of keeping pace with her. She closed the gap separating her from her ranged assailant in a matter of seconds. Three more of the Witch Hunters stepped into her path - looking to buy time for their archer to line up another shot she supposed. The first of the trio overextended herself to lunge forward with her spear. Fang ignored the attack, letting the shield from her Quen burst as it absorbed the blow before she retaliated, gripping the hunter's spear and yanking the weapon back. Its wielder's grip was tight, and the woman followed the weapon, tripping forward over her own feet as she stumbled forwards. The tip of Kain's Lance pierced the worn chainmail like cloth, and the hunter's grip on her weapon failed as Fang yanked her lance back out of the woman's chest. Fang ducked under a horizontal slash, deflecting the stab of a longsword with a spin of her lance as the hunters companions came - belatedly - to her defense. These two had a bit of coordination to their names, and Fang was forced to take several steps back as they pressured her from multiple angles. Another arrow soared into the melee, and Fang bit back a grunt as this one found a gap in her armour and embedded itself in her side. Damn archer was good.

Faced with the pressure of more arrows as deadly accurate as that one, Fang didn't have time to wait for an opening. She was sure the hunters she'd left behind had found their feet again, and there was at least one other unaccounted for as well. Fortunately, she had the tools to make her own. She flashed another sign, and the air before her was suddenly embroiled in flames, one of the hunters she'd been dueling panicking as his clothes were caught up in the fire. She exploited the opening, and cleaved him from hip to shoulder, the blade of her lance tearing through armour and flesh alike. She left the mortally wounded and burning witch hunter to die and set to work dispatching the other. He hadn't stood a chance against her with allies. Alone, it was a criminally unfair fight.

He swiped at her with his sword, and Fang knocked the weapon aside with a lazy parry. The move put her well inside the witch hunter's guard, and she struck with an upwards slash that aimed to take the man's arm off at the shoulder. Miraculously, he managed to throw himself backwards just enough that the blade only scratched him. Fang hardly minded. She hit the catch on the haft of her weapon, letting it split into three chain-linked pieces, and stabbed forward with a series of deadly thrusts, each meeting their fatal mark. By the time she was finished, the man's chest was a perforated mess of gore and ruined chainmail. He fell back without so much as a gasp and Fang turned her attention back to her original target.

She brought up a Quen barrier just in time as another arrow met its mark, and she stalked towards the archer with predatory intent. The archer desperately tried to nock another arrow, before tossing her bow aside with a cry of frustration. She pulled a dagger from her belt and eyed Fang warily.

"There you go, Sunshine." Fang lashed out, grinning as the archer backpedaled. There was a snap as her lance made contact with her target, the discarded bow broken cleanly in two its lethal edge. "Now try fighting with a real weapon." She attacked for real, forcing the woman back with a series of probing slashes and strikes. A dagger was useless against the reach of her lance, to the point that the woman might have been better off with no weapon at all. Fang stalked forward, pressing the witch hunter further and further until, eventually, her back hit the very literal wall. Fang savoured the way the blood seemed to drain from the woman's face. "Not a good place to be, is it?" Fang asked. "Back against the wall, a hunter in your face? Betcha you're used to seein' it from the other side. Not so pleasant from this side though, is it?"

The witch hunter snarled, and lunged at her with a stab. Fang could see it almost as though it were in slow motion. The hunter's movements were clumsy, and Fang could easily tell that the motion was unfamiliar. She reached out with her left hand, and grabbed the woman's wrist, halting the movement immediately. Her grip was tight enough to cut off the flow of blood, and she could see the hunter's face immediately twist in pain. Just a little tighter, and Fang was sure she could shatter the woman's wrist completely.

"Give me one reason not to gut you like a viper."

"Would any reason be good enough?"

Fang's eyes narrowed. Planting her lance in the ground for a moment, she lashed out with a right hook, fist connecting with the side of the witch hunter's head and letting her collapse bonelessly to the ground. Then she let out a startled gasp as she felt something cold pierce through her back. "Get away from her!" she heard somebody shout. She kicked behind her, hearing a muffled grunt of pain as her foot made contact with something, and she yanked Kain's Lance out of its resting place as she turned to face her newest assailant. She could still feel the weapon - a knife, it felt like - impaled in her back, but it didn't feel like it had hit anything important. Better to leave it there to keep the bleeding down, for now. Internally, Fang berated herself for getting so caught up in the moment she let a fucking witch hunter sneak up on her. Then she laid eyes on her attacker, sprawled in the dirt from the kick she'd hit him the gut with, and those thoughts left her.

The hood the witch hunter must have been wearing before had fallen back at some point in the fighting, revealing an untamed mop of silver hair and a face that couldn't have seen more than fourteen winters. "You're just a damned kid," Fang breathed. The fires were out now, and Fang could see that Vanille had the three hunters she hadn't dealt with well bound up with her binding rod. Vanille was safe and Oerba was safe. She felt some of the fury leave her.

"Hope," Fang heard the trembling voice of the archer speak up from behind her. "Just get out of here."

The boy struggled to his feet. "No!" he shouted. "I'm not leaving you behind!" And then so quietly that even Fang could barely hear it: "It's my fault you're here in the first place." He looked up at Fang as she approached and his eyes widened. "How are you-"

"Hate to say it kid, but you missed everything vital. Hurts though. Closer than most get, all considered."

Hope balked, his face warped by the weight of his disbelief. "You killed all those people!"

Fang grinned. "I'm a Witcher with a few screws loose. Killin's easy when you're used to it". Hope paled. "Oi! Vanille!" Fang called out. "If you're done hogtying our friends over there, I've got some new ones for you to meet!"

Vanille bounded over, only to halt with a gasp when Fang turned to check on the archer. "Fang, you've got a knife stuck in you!" She paused. "And an arrow!"

Fang laughed. It hurt only a little. "These two did a bit of a number on me. We can pull 'em out once you've got time and space to fix 'em. No point bleeding everywhere until then."

Vanille nodded her head in acceptance, and then looked the two witch hunters over. "Will you two walk with us to the holding cells, or do I need to get the ropes out?"

"This'll be a whole lot easier if you come quietly," Fang added with a shrug. "Although if you ask me, Vanille believes too much in second chances."

Hope looked like he was going to levy some sort of protest, but the voice of the archer silenced him. "We'll walk. Hope, can you help me up?"

The boy immediately scurried over, helping the woman pull herself up off the ground, then lodging herself under her arm to help her walk. "Lebreau, are you alright?" He asked.

"My head's spinning and I can't seem to think straight, but I'll walk it off."

"Fang, I think you gave her a concussion," Vanille scolded.

"She shot me!"

"That's true." Vanille nodded sagely. "Well time to go. The holding cells won't come to you, you know. Oh and they're really much nicer than they sound. I think the beds are more comfortable than Fang's, although that's probably because she likes sleeping on rocks in the first place."

Hope stared blankly as Vanille began to skip away. "I-"

Fang pushed him forward. "Just follow her. And don't get any bright ideas."

Vanille continued to chatter as they made their way back through the narrow streets towards the building where Oerba typically contained its various malcontents. Fang tuned it out, instead focusing on the smattering of people lining the streets, watching for anyone that might look to take justice into their own hands. In Fang's mind, they damn well had a right to, but Vanille was insistent in her definition of fair treatment, so for now, Fang could set aside her misgivings. They passed through uneventfully, until Fang noticed a rush of movement to her side. One hand was already reaching for her lance as she turned to face the commotion, though she relaxed when she saw the source. A little girl was running towards her, ignoring Fang's temporary charges completely.

"Miss Fang! Miss Fang!" She cried out. Fang couldn't resist the smile that tugged at her cheeks. "My mommy says you saved us! My mommy says you're a hero!" The girl was bouncing on her feet as she stood before her, and Fang could see out of the corner of her eye that Vanille and the two captive hunters had paused their procession.

"Well, little Aerith," Fang said, because although she'd deny it to the ends of the earth, the children of Oerba held a soft spot in her mutagen-altered heart, "I'd say that Vanille did all the saving. She put out the fires while I made sure she was safe. She's the hero."

"That just means you're both heroes!" Aerith insisted.

Fang laughed. "I'm glad you think so. Now run along home. We wouldn't want your momma to worry, would we?"

Aerith shook her head, but as she turned to run off again, she paused, her eyes wide. "Miss Fang, there's something stuck in you!"

"It's a souvenir, darling. Just something we witchers get from time to time. Don't let it worry your pretty little head."

Aerith nodded her head, clearly satisfied by the answer. Fang watched as the girl turned away, then cut a clumsy path back down the street. The witcher looked back towards her captives, carefully observing the way the boy stared at her like his world had been cut out from under him.

"Keep walking," Fang growled and gestured vaguely at the surrounding buildings. "I haven't forgotten why you came here, and neither have they." They walked the last short stretch towards Oerba's jailhouse in silence, even Vanille content to let the quiet linger for a time. The ones Vanille had bound earlier were already carted over, and were in the process of being relieved of anything that could possibly constitute weapons or armour by what Fang presumed was a volunteer task force of villagers. Fang nodded with approval as one of the villagers came away with a handful of hairpins. They knew what to look for.

Fang pulled her sister aside. "I'll take it from here, 'Nille."

Vanille squared her shoulders. "Fang, I will not have you bludgeoning our prisoners as soon as I look away."

"Look, I didn't kill 'em while you were looking away before, and I was angry then. I'm not gonna kill 'em now." Vanille's hard look didn't fade. "Look, I might not be dying but the knife in my back is hardly comfortable. Could you just… get what you need to take care of it? Please?" Vanille's eyes softened, and she turned away with a sigh.

"Fine. But I mean it Fang. If you so much as throw a sucker punch, I won't be happy."

"I believe you. Now go on girl, get! I'm still stabbed over here." As Vanille all but pranced her way out of the building, Fang let herself relax into a seated position on the floor. "Hey," she started, grabbing the attention of one of the villagers. "Wake me up once you're certain you've looked over everything, and I'll give them all a once over, just in case." The villager nodded his acquiescence, and Fang closed her eyes, body and mind collapsing into a deep meditative trance.

* * *

She approached with silent footfalls, steps guided by the faint glow radiating from the cliffside cavern above her. She stopped only when she could go no farther, placing one hand against the harsh stone face of the cliff, craning her neck to take in the contrast of the dim luminescence against the blackened backdrop of the night sky. Her heart felt heavy - far heavier than the lone sword hanging uselessly from her hip, its perfect blade impotent against the guilt warring with her conscience.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, her voice steady and resolute. "I'll fix this. I promise."

* * *

 _I always thought Fang would be great with kids. Just so long as she's not committed to them, I guess. Best aunt ever, but no time for being a mother._

 _Anyway, this fandom's heyday was well before CD Projekt Red blessed us with the Witcher 3, which tragically means we never seemed to get a Witcher AU, something any self respecting fandom isn't complete without. I think Fang would be an awesome witcher, in an "I know we've used swords since the founding of our order, but this double sided lance is just the greatest thing ever" sort of way. Hopefully this story shows that._

 _You can follow me on my tumblr that I'm just restarting to catch sneak previews of upcoming chapters as well as send me questions or prompts or whatever else you're interested in sending. I might also post stuff for random prompts from Fangrai Forever that I like as well. Find that here (remove the spaces): www . tumblr blog / orderlyanarchist_

 _If tumblr isn't your thing, you can also leave any questions or whatever that you might have for me in a review, because I do in fact read those and will definitely get back to you._


	2. Tolerance

_Credit continues to go to Duck, XalkXolc, Evelos, and my awesome thesis advisor for going over my work with me and helping to improve it. As a disclaimer, I own none of ff13 or anything relating to The Witcher, nor do I own any of the characters I'm borrowing from those ips._

* * *

"I can't apply my salves while your armour is on, Fang." Vanille huffed as she tugged helplessly at one of the moulded plates of armour that adorned Fang's shoulders.

"It comes apart for a reason, Vanille. Just take off the pieces you need to and get on with it."

"It's pinned to your back by a knife! I can't just-"

Fang snaked one arm around behind her back until she felt her grip tighten around the handle of the knife still lodged in her back. With a sharp tug, she pulled the offending implement free, heedless of the way a sharp spike of pain heralded a reinvigorated surge of bleeding, fresh blood staining the back of her armour as the stab wound suddenly found itself opened.

"Now it's not," Fang grunted. "Get to work, sister."

"I can't believe you!" Vanille protested, but she quickly set about struggling with Fang's armour. Fang could feel her entire ensemble shift slightly forward as the connections for the moulded chaincoat protecting her back were unattached at her waist and shoulders. It slipped to the floor immediately, exposing the undershirt beneath as the chainlink garment rattled to the floor. She heard a faint tearing as Vanille quickly cut the surrounding fabric away, and Fang felt a pang of disappointment rush through her. She liked that shirt; now she'd have to ask the local seamstress if she could fix it or make another one.

"It's just a shirt, Fang," Vanille said, and Fang felt her muscles relax slightly as Vanille's fingers lathered the area around her open wound with a chilling salve, the cold settling deep beneath her skin.

"It was blue," Fang argued. "I like blue."

"And if you'd been more careful, you wouldn't have ruined it," Vanille reprimanded. "Now don't move. This is still going to-"

Fang cut her off. "I'm hardly virgin to this. I know it'll-" Fang hissed as every muscle in her back seemed to tense at once. Her medallion tugged frantically at its chain, and she could feel the heat of Vanille's magic seeping beneath her skin. Her flesh felt like it was quivering, then surged into motion, knitting itself back together at the behest of Vanille's aggressive encouragement. Fang growled, low and rumbling, as she buried the urge to lash out at the source of the burning. She felt like a thousand coiling serpents were writhing beneath her skin. "Fuck," she said, when the process was finally over. "Never gonna feel right, burnin' up from the inside like that."

"Is it really any different than your potions?" Vanille asked, curious.

Fang resisted the urge to grit her teeth. She was better than this. "Told you before that Swallow doesn't work as fast as that. And I don't touch White Raffard. That stuff's more poison than potion."

"They all are, if you ask me," Vanille muttered.

"Good thing I didn't," Fang rebutted. "Now are you gonna take care of this arrow or what?"

Vanille whispered several remarks under her breath as she knelt down to examine the arrow. Fang made out the words insufferable and stubborn thrown into the mix, and decided it was a reasonable assumption they were all directed at her.

"The arrowhead, is it straight or barbed?" Vanille asked.

Fang was about to reply that she couldn't easily check what with it being lodged inside her when a voice from the direction of the cell block interjected.

"It's barbed. Hooks along both edges," the voice offered. The archer, Fang recognized. Lebreau, her mind helpfully added. There was an apologetic lilt to her tone.

Vanille frowned. "Fang…" Her voice was strained, weighted by a strange mixture of guilt and hesitation.

"I know what that means Vanille." Fang's tone brooked no reproach. "Just give me something to bite down on and get it over with."

Vanille stood straighter, looking for all of a moment like she wanted to argue before her shoulders slumped and she turned to rummage through her supplies.

"I don't know what you have against anesthetic," Vanille griped, retrieving and reluctantly offering a thick strip of cured leather.

Fang shrugged, reaching out with one hand to accept the offering. "Doesn't take in the first place," she argued. "No use wastin' it."

"Hmph. You'll take it one day," Vanille insisted.

"And I'll die one day, hopefully someday after you realize just what it doesn't take means." Fang didn't like lying to her sister, but she figured that in situations like this she had a good enough reason. Medicine was a precious commodity, and even for a witcher Fang had pain tolerance to spare. She bit down on the leather strip, her tongue curling away in distaste as she was met with the unpleasant flavour of tanned hide. She nodded once.

Vanille's face was a hard line as she removed a wickedly serrated dagger from its resting place at her hip. She carefully pressed the blade against the wooden shaft of the arrow, before sawing through it with quick, efficient motions, cutting away the nock and fletching and leaving only the bare shaft of the arrow jutting out from its lodging in Fang's waist. After briefly inspecting the cut and plucking away several loose slivers, the sorceress gripped the remainder of the arrow with her gloved hands. "Sorry," she breathed, apologetic. Then without another moment of hesitation, she pushed it in.

Fang ground her teeth against the leather in her mouth as she felt the arrowhead carve a vicious path through her flesh. The pain almost seemed to amplify the processes of her mind, granting Fang full access to its analytical portion in order to precisely describe the agony that proceeded to wrack her body. She could feel the way her flesh split against the probing point of the arrowhead, the metal itself warmed by the internal heat of her body and coating of fresh blood. The shaft of the arrow followed behind the tip like a snake, the smooth wood surface like the course scales of a serpent as it scraped its way through her innards. She felt where Vanille's hands pressed against the open wound, the fibers of her thin leather gloves pricking against her like needles as she tried to force the arrow through the last stretch of distance. Her teeth attacked the leather mouthguard like a hacksaw, cutting through the outer layer and choking her with the taste of torn leather.

Fang considered turning aside just to spit out some of the repulsive taste, but her attention was suddenly consumed by the sudden opening of another hole in her waist, the skin of her back sliced open by the razor tip of the arrow as it forced its way back out of her body. Fang bit down harder. After a few excruciating moments, Vanille scrambled behind her to grasp the arrow by its head and Fang took that moment to ponder the strangeness of having the back of an arrow lodged inside her while the point stuck out from her back. She inhaled, tasting more leather and almost coughing as small pieces of it caught in her throat.

Vanille yanked the arrow free in a sharp motion, and Fang fought the urge to curl up as the last remnants of the arrow finally slipped loose. Her teeth clicked together.

"Well that's the worst of it done!" Vanille exclaimed, offering her a bright smile.

Fang turned away and spat out two ragged strips of leather

"Now hold still while I apply the salve again."

Once again, the salve's application heralded a sharp chill that sunk deep beneath Fang's skin.

"Ready?" Vanille asked.

"Am I ever not?"

Vanille nodded, and her hands once more began to glow with a steady orange light as she uttered a string of whispered incantations. Fang's flesh heated to a burn as Vanille's magic seized control of it, the deep chill of the salve swiftly overpowered. Fang fought to keep her expression neutral as her insides began to squirm. On a whim, and admittedly searching for some small distraction, she tossed a glance towards the cellblock across from her and its newly arrived residents. Her gaze was met by an eclectic mix of fear, revulsion, disgust, and… admiration? Not often a witcher saw that. If it wasn't for keeping awful company and the minor fact that she shot her, Fang thought she could've gotten along with the archer just fine. The woman had steel in her, even if she did crutch on range. Observing her companions, however, Fang easily concluded that she could most certainly not say the same for them. The trio in the first cell were whispering amongst each other now, one of the men glancing fearfully in her direction every few seconds. She doubted they were saying anything useful. Then there was the kid.

Fang would have laughed if the sensation of her insides burning up and stitching themselves together wasn't so overwhelmingly uncomfortable. The kid's face was whiter than a fresh snowfall, his expression twisted into some amalgamation of terror, disbelief, and disgust. She managed a disarming smile.

"Something on my face?" she asked. The kid took a hesitant step back.

"She's a demon," one of the other hunters whispered.

"I'll take that as a compliment," Fang quipped. She savoured the moment as the man stiffened and froze in place. She held his gaze like she wanted to burn a hole through him with her eyes. He looked away after a short while, tucking his chin into his shoulder. "Heh. Bunch of cowards, you lot are, huh? Scared of a little medicine work?" Her stomach felt like it was twisting inside out then back again. For all she knew it might have been.

One of the hunters pressed his hands against the bars. From the expression of exertion on his face, Fang supposed he must have been trying to rattle them. "You shut your mouth, wench!" he cried.

Fang grinned. "Finally found your guts, did you? How about we take a closer look at them?" Reaching behind her back, her palm found the grip of the knife she'd yanked from her back before. She twirled it around her fingers, drops of her own blood flicking every which way as the knife spun until she finished the motion with a flourish, tossing the knife in the air and catching the spinning blade by its tip. The surface of the blade was still stained with blood, though much of the excess had been excised by the flashy display. The witch hunter's eyes widened and he stumbled away from the bars, pressing himself into the back corner of the cell. Fang ignored him in favour of examining the survival knife now caught in her grip, inspecting it with an appraising and appreciative eye.

She captured the kid's gaze as she concluded her inspection. "This is excellent craftsmanship," she said. "Very valuable." She watched his face closely, carefully analyzing his reaction. She expected guilt, regret, or maybe surprise, some indication of an acquisition through less than savoury means. Instead pride flashed across his face. Pride and… confidence? A gift? Perhaps. If it was, Fang would put money on it coming from an authority figure in the kid's life, if the brief moment of confidence was any indication. "You know," she continued. "It might even be worth more now that you've stained it with witcher blood."

The boy looked away. Fang opened her mouth to press the assault only to fall back as she fought off a sigh of relief. The fire beneath her skin was rapidly cooling, and her writhing flesh and muscles finally seemed to calm themselves.

"All done!" Vanille cheered. Fang pressed her left hand against her waist, feeling over her skin where the arrow had penetrated then exited her body. She smiled when she realized it was not only unbroken, but unblemished. Fang worked her way to her feet, carefully observing the reactions of her body as she stood. Stretching, she felt no pain or shudders, and even a sharp twist of her waist didn't strain her in the slightest.

Vanille let out a quiet 'eep' as Fang pulled her into a tight hug, grinning wildly. "You're a miracle worker, Vanille. I don't know what I'd do without you."

"Die, probably," Vanille managed. "I think the trials broke your self-preservation instinct."

Fang allowed Vanille to squirm free of the embrace, taking several steps back. She started twirling the knife again, making sure she held the sorceress's gaze as she made the weapon dance. "Ya think?" she asked, tossing the knife in the air before catching it with her other hand. "I figure I was born without it. I don't really remember much of when they brought me in, but I met the one who claimed me from my family. He said I fought him every damned step of the way to the stronghold. Said he had half a mind to run me through with his sword and leave me half-dead for the wolves."

"Fang," Vanille gasped. "That's awful!"

"Nah, that's just life. Wasn't a bad guy, all considered. Honest bastard, and good to have at your back in a fight. Never gave me shit for rule breakin'." Fang smiled. It was often that she reminisced about the past. You spend enough years wandering, and suddenly there's too many memories to sift through. She supposed that as far as memories went, that one was a good one. "Gotta thank him if I see him again," Fang considered.

"Why would you ever thank someone like that?" Vanille demanded.

"Met you, didn't I?" Fang let a hand rest on Vanille's shoulder. "I wouldn't give up our little family for anything. I rather like havin' a little sister."

"If ya truly cared, you'd put the witch out of her misery!"

Fang whirled, quickly coming to face with the source of the interjection. The hunter she'd cowed into the corner earlier had found his spine again and was once more gripping the bars, his face a warped tapestry of outrage and spite. Fang's eyes narrowed, and she stalked towards him with predatory strides. Before he could back up more than a few steps, Fang snapped her arm out, snagging the witch hunter by his wrist with a vice grip. The hunter tugged at her arm, desperately trying to pull away to no avail. Slowly, Fang reeled him in towards the bars, pulling his arm all the way through the gap until his face was pressed between the bars, outrage spilling away to be replaced once more with a consuming terror as Fang schooled her face into something completely expressionless.

"I don't believe you understand the severity of your situation." Fang kept her voice cold and steady, accentuating her words with sharp twists and crushing squeezes of the witch hunter's wrist. "You are currently imprisoned for the assault of several villagers, the intent to murder a precious person within this community, and for attempting to burn the whole of Oerba to the ground. Right now, you are the most hated people in the area for miles, and the people around you are angry. When Vanille and I first caught you, they were crying for your hanging. I talked them down, because I wanted to personally carve out your entrails and feed them to the pigs." Fang paused, twirling the knife with a flourish in her free hand. "Can you imagine the pain?" she asked. "This little blade would carve right through your belly, splitting you open until you guts spilled out of your body. You'd live for a while too, desperately trying to cram your insides back where they belong as you slowly choke to death on your own blood. I can still make that happen. My word is worth a great deal here; if I lay down a verdict there will be no protest."

A foul smell began to waft from below, and Fang's expression twisted into a scowl. "You're pathetic. You set fire to these people's homes, all so you could murder a girl who's never once done you harm. Except you didn't just want to kill her, did you? You wanted to conquer her. You wanted to shackle her with dimeritium then beat her halfway senseless. You wanted to have your way with her so you could tell all your buddies about conquering the sorceress. You'd probably keep telling that story until the day you walked into the grave. You'd string her up and parade her through the streets like a fuckin' trophy."

Fang leaned forward so that she was face to face with the terrified hunter and leisurely bared her teeth at him. "You're gonna listen once, and you're gonna listen well. That _witch_ has begged me to spare your worthless lives. She thinks you all deserve another chance. Now you're gonna think real hard and real well on what you can do to repay that kindness, because if you can't come up with something…" Fang shoved the hunter back, turning away in disgust as he lost his footing and crashed to the floor.

"My way is still on the table."

She stormed out of the jailhouse, pausing only to exchange a knowing glance with her sister.

 _You know what to do._

 _We're done with running._

* * *

"Dysley!"

She watched as the man paused his speech, quietly apologizing to his guests - she didn't recognize them, so she knew they weren't important - before pushing his chair away from the table. He stood quickly and approached her with speed belying his old age. He passed straight by her, raising a single hand as he passed to beckon her to follow him into an isolated hallway.

"You overreach yourself," he said, his brows furrowed and his eyes burning with quiet disapproval. "It is not your place to interfere with my business. This boldness of yours is not something I will tolerate."

"And your boldness is something I should? Three months, Dysley. Three months since our arrangement, and I have nothing to show for it. You made bold promises, and I'm starting to believe you don't intend to keep them."

Dysley's expression softened, though she didn't for a moment believe the empathy to be real. "Claire-"

"Lightning," she corrected, tone sharp.

Dysley continued as though she hadn't said anything. "Your sister's case is most unusual. I have scholars scouring through every last book in the kingdom and they've yet to discover a single parallel to her condition. Even my own analysis has yielded nothing resembling any curse or affliction I know."

"Then why am I still here?" Lightning snapped.

"Because you have patience. You are angry, frustrated; this is understandable. I can tell your sister is very dear to you. However, just because we have not discovered a solution yet does not mean we won't, and you have no better resources at your disposal."

"Tch." Lightning turned away with a huff. "We'll see." She made to leave, only to pause when she felt her shoulder gripped by an outstretched hand.

"You can pray for your sister all you wish," Dysley assured her. "Only I can turn those prayers into promises. If you wish to live to see your sister, I must live to dispel her affliction." He released his grip on her shoulder, and Lightning shrugged the lingering hand off of her. "Remember that."

Lightning scoffed. "Remember whose blade you live by."

"Oh I do, _Lightning_ , I do."

Lightning scowled as she walked away. She wanted nothing more to plant Blazefire in the manipulative sorcerer's throat. She gripped the hilt of the saber, immersing herself for the briefest of moments in the power that flowed between them. She could almost feel the electric sparks coursing along the edge of its finely honed blade, well hidden beneath its dragonscale sheath.

 _Call me Claire again you bastard._

* * *

 _Turns out, removing arrows is a damned brutal process, so avoid getting shot by them. That's my advice. Anyway, Lightning makes her awaited debut at the end of the chapter here; I hope you all liked it. I consider myself a person who is very receptive to criticism so if something I'm doing bothers you, speak up! I'd love to have a conversation about what you think I could be doing better!_

 _As always, feel free to follow my tumblr here: www. tumblr blog / orderlyanarchist (remove the spaces)_  
 _You'll get little previews of upcoming chapters, potentially some shorts I'm working on from the fangrai forever prompt list, and it's a good place to ask me any questions you might want answered._


	3. Making Friends

_Hey all! Sorry about the brief delay, but I really wanted to make sure my prereaders had time to go over this before I posted it. I value their insight a lot, and they've done a lot to make this story better, so I'm more than willing to veer off schedule a bit if it means I can have their insight before publishing. Anyway, I won't be updating next Saturday, as I'll be attending Grand Prix Toronto over the weekend and have been spending this week preparing for the tournament. We should return to our regular schedule the weekend after though, hopefully without more disruption (as if, right?)._

 _Anyway I don't own Final Fantasy or The Witcher franchise and the characters I've borrowed from those franchises are also not mine. Full credit to Squenix and Sapowski for their creative brilliance. Special thanks goes out to the usual crew, XalkXolc, Duck, and Evelos. Special condemnation also goes out to Evelos for convincing me to read Game of Thrones and where did all my free time go?_

 _Enjoy!_

* * *

Fang wasted no time upon exiting the small jailhouse. "Hey, You!" she called out, grabbing the attention of a passerby she recognized, but couldn't put a name to. The man halted immediately, turning to face her.

"Master Witcher?" he inquired, tensing slightly.

"Just got a few questions about the state of the village," Fang reassured him, watching as the man visibly relaxed. "You know if they've started cleaning up the town square yet?"

He scratched his head. "Not yet. The elders thought it pressin', but that new fella' Kreiss convinced 'em to wait on ya. Said you'd want to 'vestigate 'em, or somesuch thinkin'. All a bit beyond me, iffen I might say so."

Fang laughed. "Noel had the right idea, don't you worry about that. I'll finish up my ' _vestigatin'_ soon as can be, and the elders can have the square cleaned up right proper."

The man exhaled, the last of the tension vacating him in a single relieved breath. He chuckled quietly. "Take the time ya need, Master Witcher. I'm thinkin I speak for all of Oerba when I say we're truly thankful to you and Miss Vanille for dealin' with them raiders and puttin' out the fires."

The witcher turned away, rolling her shoulders back as she did so. "Oerba's our home too. You've treated us well here - better than most. Long as we're here, we'll return the favour." Fang brought two fingers to her lips, calling for Bahamut with a shrill whistle. The powerful stallion was at her side in a matter of moments, and she mounted him side saddle, letting both her legs hang over his right side as Bahamut eased into a leisurely trot. Fang waved a brief farewell to the villager.

"You know where to go, don't you?" she asked, as the horse trotted in the direction of their destination. Bahamut snorted, tossing his head in a way that might have suggested offence. "Damn right you do. Smarter than a horse has any right to be, aren't ya, sweetheart?" Fang heard a brief swishing before she felt a light smack against her back. She turned her head just in time to catch Bahamut's tail retreating from where it had struck her, and chuckled. "We're a match made in heaven aren't we?" Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. "I'll make sure the stable girl finds some apples for you tonight, yeah?" Bahamut whinnied his appreciation, and Fang let her amusement play across her features as the stallion noticeably increased his pace.

Oerba being as small as it was, it didn't take long for Fang to find herself back in the village center. She was pleased to see the villager from before had been correct, and the town square had been left in almost exactly the state she'd left it. It surprised her, really. She'd thought the elders would be keen to have the violence cleaned up and the bodies disposed of. Her eyes locked on a figure leaning casually against one of the burnt out walls of Oerba's town hall.

He was a mid-sized man, with messy brown hair that fell just short of his shoulders and sharp features that suggested a level of cunning and intelligence largely foreign to the more rustic village. His eyes reasserted his status as a foreigner, a piercing blue that Fang had not once encountered in the vicinity of the village. He wore a purple-dyed leather vest over a tight navy blue undershirt with sleeves that cut off just above his elbows, leaving the man's forearms fully exposed, but for a thick leather bracer protecting the wrist of his left arm. Both shirt and vest were tucked into a pair of sky blue slacks that looked just a little too baggy to be practical, although by all accounts he moved around in them just fine. The bottoms were bloused, and he completed the ensemble with a pair of black leather boots, and a gold fabric pelt from which a trio of pink tassels dangled at his side.

"Noel!" Fang called out, sliding easily off of Bahamut's back and approaching the hunter. "I'm told I've got you to thank for keepin' all my fine work on display?" Noel pushed away from the blackened wood, meeting Fang's approach halfway and reaching out with one arm. Fang took the offer, clasping the outstretched hand in a firm handshake.

"Naturally," he said. "Let it not be said I deprived a witcher of her investigation."

"Always knew there was a reason I liked you," Fang quipped. "You plannin' to stick around while I work?"

Noel nodded. "I admit I'm curious."

"Pay attention and maybe you'll learn something. This kinda work is hunters work; the skills translate." With that, Fang broke off the conversation, carefully examining the scene of the night's commotion. The corpses lay exactly where they'd fallen, still relatively fresh all considered. "You're all dead men now, aren't you?" she muttered. "But which of you have tales to tell?"

The witcher's eyes settled on the body of the woman who'd thought to negotiate, a scant few seconds before Kain's Lance gutted her. Fang approached her quickly, going down on one knee to unclasp and remove the witch hunter's ruined jacket. "This one was probably in charge," she said aloud, for the benefit of her audience. "Tried to talk things out, and once I tore her guts out, didn't hear so much as a single order during the fight."

"You think she'd carry evidence?" Noel asked, dubious.

Fang shrugged, digging through the jackets various pockets. "You get lucky sometimes. I've seen enough bandits carrying written orders to know it's always worth looking." After turning the jacket inside out, she didn't find much in the way of incriminating evidence, but the witcher did come away with a fistfull of golden coins. "Not a bad haul, is it? We can put it towards fixing the damage they did with that fire." Fang stuffed the coins into an empty pouch before fleecing the witch hunter's body for anything else either valuable or incriminating. She sighed when nothing else came up, craning her neck to look back at Noel.

"If you've got the stomach for it, you might as well help me go through the rest of them," she said, gesturing towards the cluster of bodies in the area where she'd charged the archer. "I'd rather get this place cleaned up sooner than later. Last thing Oerba needs is for ghouls to come crawlin' in."

Noel nodded. "Can't say I like it, but I'll take care of it." He departed in the direction of the witch hunter corpses Fang had indicated while the witcher focused her attention on the ones in her more immediate vicinity.

"Well… Let's see if the rest of you have secrets you're hidin'."

As it turned out, the rest of them weren't hiding much of anything beyond a few handfuls of gil and some shoddy daggers and knives.

"Nothing on yours either?" Fang asked. Noel only replied with a dejected shake of his head.

"What now?" the Oerban hunter asked.

"Now?" Fang grinned. "Kreiss, let me ask you a question. Oerba's an isolated village. How far away do you think we are from the nearest bastion of civilization?"

"A few days on horseback?" he suggested. "So long as you follow the trails, at least."

"And walking?" Fang pushed.

"Weeks." Noel scoffed. "You'd be crazy or desperate to walk all the way here." Fang could see the very moment when realization sparked in the hunters eyes. She let her gaze drift over the bodies strewn throughout the square.

"I see a buncha dead witch hunters, but I don't see any horses."

"They have a camp outside the village," Noel realized.

"Attaboy." Fang slapped the hunter on the back. He barely kept his feet as he stumbled under the weight of the impact. "Ready for a hike?" Fang focused her gaze on the ground, carefully observing the different impressions and scattered markings along the ground. "It's a lucky thing everybody's stayin' away from here for now. Killin' these guys tore up the ground enough; the last thing we'd need is a bunch of foot traffic mussin' up the terrain." She set off in the direction of a slim gap between buildings, her eyes narrowing as she took a the steady line of booted footprints. "And I found our mark," she called out. The prints were pressed deeper into the earth than was standard for the village, a telltale sign of heavier combat-oriented footwear. From the prints it was obvious they'd approached in a loose two by two formation. Divots were pressed into the earth with consistent spacing, suggesting that one of the witch hunters opted to use their spear as some sort of walking stick.

"Not ones for hiding their tracks, are they?" Noel asked from beside her.

Fang shook her head. "These ones weren't much for doin' anything right. Should be easy for you to trace 'em back to their source."

"Fang?"

"I know I can track 'em, so I want you to do it." Fang raised her index finger then harshly poked him in the chest, forcing the hunter to take a half-step back. "There's going to be day when Vanille and I aren't around solve problems, so it's bloody well time somebody else picked up the skills. You're no peasant, and I know those claws of yours aren't the only thing keepin' you out of the ordinary." Fang let her lips quirk upwards into a small half-smile as she saw Noel's eyes widen.

"You noticed?" It hardly escaped Fang's notice when the man took several more steps back for distance, his arms coming up in a defensive posture.

"I was made to notice your sorta folk." Fang raised an eyebrow as the hunter fixed her with a glare. "Oh woulda ya relax? I'm not gonna gut you." Holding her left hand out in a pacifying gesture, Fang slowly drew her silver sword from its place at her back, before offering it to hunter hilt first. As soon as his grip closed around the handle, the tension practically bled out of his shoulders. He observed the blade carefully, running a single gloved finger over the blade's finely crafted surface.

"Sorry." Noel said. The tension might have left him, but Fang still caught the faint shadow of uncertainty lurking within his eyes. "I'm used to torches and pitchforks."

Fang shrugged. "So long as people aren't disappearin' in the night, you'll have no trouble from me, though If I could take a day to look over your safeguards, I'd say we'd both sleep easier for it."

Noel nodded. "If you're not after a trophy, then that's alright with me." He turned his gaze to the ground, indicating a silent end to that particular line of conversation. "You want me to follow these, huh?" He offered back the silver sword, and Fang slung the weapon over her back and into its sheath in a single smooth motion.

"If you're up for it."

Noel scoffed. The hunter had already followed the trail a ways down the alley, and was in the midst of turning onto a path that led straight to Oerba's outskirts. "A child could follow the trail these guys left behind."

"I see," was all Fang said, as she trailed the hunter from a short distance behind.

The duo followed the trail of footprints all the way to the clearing edge that doubled as the outer limits of the village. Even as the grassy terrain morphed into woodland, the trail left behind by the witch hunters was no less obvious. Fang took in the trampled undergrowth, obviously hacked away branches, and even the snapped twigs on the ground. "Nilfgaardian cavalry could be more subtle than this," she groused. "A kid probably _could_ follow this trail."

Noel was already stalking through the forest, his own footsteps carefully placed to minimize their disturbance of the environment. Fang nodded with approval at that. There was plenty of room for improvement, but teaching advanced tracking and evasion skills to a hunter who already grasped the basics of silent and untrackable movement was a relatively simple task, all considered. Following the hunter into the forest, they had only traveled perhaps a few hundred meters before a soft glow immediately seized Fang's attention. It shone through several gaps in the vegetation, illuminating what Fang imagined was a small clearing within the woods. Even through the obstructing leaves and branches, the witcher could make out the shadows of several objects within the dim light. Silently, Fang crept towards the lightsource, only to pause as Noel raised his hand in an open palm, the almost universal gesture for 'halt'. Internally, a part of her mind was fuming about following any instruction or direction that wasn't her own. Fortunately, she'd become rather talented at ignoring that part of her mind throughout her decades of travelling with Vanille, and dismissed it without too much trouble. If the situation was anything like she expected it to turn out to be, it would be very important that she figure out the kid's level of competence sooner than later.

She watched as the hunter slunk his way into the clearing, losing sight of him as he disappeared behind one of the shadows. Several minutes passed, though Fang was hardly worried. It was more than likely that if the hunter ran into trouble, such trouble would be heralded by a great deal of shouting and alarm. The glow wavered as the witcher looked on, the telltale flicker of a controlled fire not escaping her, even if she couldn't lay eyes on the blaze directly. A lit fire in an hours old campsite signified a number of things - most importantly, it assured Fang that their little trip might be much more productive than she'd initially anticipated.

Her eyes caught sight of Noel the moment he slunk back into the shadows of their spot in the woods, creeping his way through the underbrush until he was standing beside her. Fang raised an eyebrow when she noticed the longsword he loosely gripped in his right hand. It was of surprisingly fine make, though several notches in the bladed edge belied the absence of proper maintenance. Still, in spite of the nicks and dulling, the weapon looked serviceable.

"Never took you for the thievin' kind," Fang said, amused.

"The way this sword's been treated, I thought of it more as a rescue mission."

Fang shrugged. "Whatever helps you sleep." She kept one eye focused on the flickering light of the camp as she continued to address the hunter. "You find anything else? Or were the shinies distracting?"

Noel scoffed. "Funny. There's three witch hunters that I saw, and a whole group of horses tethered up in the back."

Fang nodded her approval. "Bunch of fresh horses would do Oerba a whole lot of good right now. Target locations?"

"One of them's all cocooned and cozy in his tent by the fire. The second guy's just sitting around the fire - keeping watch I suppose - and the third guy seemed like he was looking after the horses. Not much else to see," Noel admit. "It's just a bit campsite with a lot of empty tents."

"Few more once we're done." The witcher focused her attention on the Oerban hunter, looking him over carefully. "We didn't come looking for a fight, but now that we've found one… Well I'm not one to pass it up. You any good with that liberated weapon of yours?"

Noel smirked, and Fang could easily read the confidence in his expression. "Good enough for a few discount thugs and mercs," he assured her, holding the weapon up in a reasonable impression of a duelist's stance.

Fang turned away, appeased by the assurance, and began her careful approach of the edge of the campsite. "Just remember," she said, looking back over her shoulder. Her eyes were hard, their usual spark of amusement doused by her cold focus on the task at hand. "We only need one."

It was a short trip to the edge of the clearing, where Fang could easily make out the details of the campsite before them. She lay prone at the edge, the heavy undergrowth largely obscuring her from chance detection. Silently, Noel crawled up to lie beside her.

"I'll take the one by the fire," Fang whispered. "You deal with the one in the tent then take care of the horse tender." The hunter nodded his understanding. "Good. Now go."

Fang was on her feet in an instant, stalking towards the campfire. Her mark faced away from her, and the quiet rustling of her armour didn't seem to catch his attention. She closed half the distance before she was spotted, a shout of alarm ringing out from the direction of the horse corral. Her target spun to face her, desperately freeing his sword from its place at his side. He got it up just in time to block a devastating overhead chop from Kain's Lance, the quiver of his arms visible as they trembled beneath the powerful assault. Fang pulled back in an instant, leaving the witch hunter off balance as he briefly fought back against a downward force that was no longer present and struck at his side. The hunter threw himself aside with a cry, narrowly avoiding the bladed lance, as it swept through the space he'd previously occupied.

Fang smirked when she realized how close the witch hunter had landed to the still-burning campfire. "Not a bad dive," the witcher admit. One of the witch hunter's legs dipped over the edge of the fire pit as he scrambled backwards. A tongue of fire seized the opportunity to lash out at the vulnerable limb, a small blaze quickly breaking out along the worn fabric. "Still, I'd work on that landing." The witch hunter panicked as he noticed the fire creeping up his leg, his focus split between the looming threat of immolation and the much more immediate threat of a witcher eviscerating him with a lance. He shook his leg frantically as he backpedalled, vainly hoping that the jerky motions would somehow dampen the hungry flames. Fang exploited the distraction without mercy, her lance driving forward in a series of vicious strikes. Despite the fire, the hunter managed to guard against the attacks with a series of desperate parries, avoiding a fatal injury, though he bled from a number of shallow cuts where Fang's strikes couldn't be fully deflected and instead glanced against his skin.

The flames licked at the witch hunter's overcoat, and Fang didn't fail to notice the way the hunter's face was twisted into an expression of absolute pain. "There's somethin' awful karmic about this, ain't there?" she taunted, before thrusting Kain's lance forward in a brutal stab. She battered aside the man's distracted guard like it was hardly there and the tip of the lance buried itself in the man's stomach. His sword fell from his grip as his strength suddenly failed, and he grasped weakly at the shaft of the weapon, as though prying it loose might save him. He offered a brief moment of struggle, before his arms fell away from the lance and he was nothing more than dead weight hanging from the tip of her weapon. The witcher yanked her weapon free, heedless of the blood that splattered her, and turned to approach the part of the camp she'd assigned to Noel. She fought off a peal of laughter.

The Oerban hunter was engaged with a witch hunter clad in nothing but boxers and an undershirt. The witch hunter was swinging a mace with wild abandon, his reckless swings not coming close to landing as Noel weaved and ducked around them. The Oerban fought back with light, probing strikes, clearly more intended to unbalance than to harm. Eventually, the witch hunter stepped forward to follow through with a mighty swing - and stumbled forward into empty space. Noel easily dipped under the man's weapon arm, wrapping around to lash out at his exposed back. He stabbed forward with his sword, running the witch hunter through from his back to his chest, then pulled his weapon free and kicked the man viciously in the back, sending him crashing into a heap on the ground, blood slowly oozing from the mortal wound. He didn't get back up.

"Good work!" Fang called out.

Noel gave a nod of appreciation, but quickly turned his focus in the direction of the horses, his bloody sword held out before him. Fang followed his gaze to the last of the witch hunters. Some of the horses had panicked during the commotion, straining at their tethers, and on instinct, the rest had followed suit. The final witch hunter was frantically trying to calm one, one hand combing through its mane while the other offered half an apple, a desperate offering to try and distract the beast from its terror. He chanced a glance backwards and paled, pressing his face into the horses mane as though the long hairs of the steed might hide him from the encroaching horror.

Fang approached slowly, recognizing the absence of threat posed by the final hunter. She caught the eyes of her companion. "Bit of a coward, isn't he?" Noel shrugged. "Well?" Fang called out, directing her voice towards the cowering witch hunter. "You gonna fight? Or were you plannin' to lay down and die?"

He faced her slowly, afraid to even look at her. "I- I'm not a fighter!" he cried. "I just look after the horses! Honest!"

"Not a fighter, huh?" Fang looked him over. The witch hunter's entire body was trembling. "Well you don't look the part, that's for damn sure." She gave her lance a casual twirl. "An abettor, then." Fang sighed, long, drawn out, and dramatic, before addressing Noel. "Y'know, aidin' an abbettin's just as bad as fightin' in my books." Noel nodded severely.

"I don't even know what that means!" The witch hunter pleaded. Most of the horses had calmed in the absence of clashing steel. The mare the man had been desperately calming before Fang had seized his attention leaned into him, putting its head between him and the approaching witcher, like a protective barrier. The witch hunter seemed to calm a little. "I just take care of the horses," he reiterated. "Really. That's all I do."

Fang took several more languid steps forward, letting her lance rest over her shoulder. "Well then… You got a name, not-a-fighter?"

"Uh…" he hesitated, uncertain. Fang shot him a too-wide smile. "It's Sommersworth," He managed. "Glen. Glen Sommersworth. Comes from my mama's side and I know that ain't the most normal thi-" Fang halted the rambling with an outstretched hand.

"You see my friend over there, Glen?" Fang pointed at Noel with the tip of her lance, before returning it to her shoulder. The witch hunter nodded. "Well he's quiet, doesn't really talk much, but he's a right proper bastard. He'll gut you quick as a fish if he decides he doesn't like ya." Noel growled menacingly. Fang laughed. "And Noel here… Well he really doesn't like most folk. Course we get along well enough, and after a bit of an incident in an inn back in Novigrad, he made me a promise that he'd never cut up one of my friends again." Glen shivered, his eyes wide. "I think we could be friends Glen, don't you?"

It was almost adorable how violently the witch hunter's head nodded.

"Of course, you understand that friendship is a give and take, I'm sure." Fang was only a few steps away now, and Glen's horse snorted in warning. Fang pulled off a glove, extending an open palm to the horse's snout in a gentle gesture and offering it a gentle smile. It sniffed her, then licked her palm. "I'll give you my friendship, Glen, but I'm gonna need to get something in return for it."

"What do you want?" he asked, hesitant.

"Information," Fang breathed. She brushed her ungloved hand through the horse's mane absentmindedly. It pressed into her touch. "Your friends came marching into my village, set fire to people's homes, and tried to kill my sister. I know somebody sent them here, Glen. A true friend would be able to tell me who."

"They… set fire?" Glen whispered.

"Yep. Town gathering centre and the elder's houses, burnt right out." Fang's voice turned hard. "Who sent them? Who's coming after my people?"

"I- I only know a little," he stammed. "The boss didn't meet with them directly. There was a middleman I think. It was a tavern in the capital - I think it was named after some woman or something. One of the guys said it had some sorta secret meaning, but he never told me what. I swear I don't know anything specific beyond that. I only know that that the boss said we were hired by somebody very important, and they were too busy to speak with him in person. He said it was an important job, and we'd be heroes to Eden if we pulled it off."

"The heroes who razed a village," Fang drawled. "Glamorous."

"I didn't know," Glen whimpered.

"Course you didn't," Fang muttered. "No one ever knows they're abetting."

"What?" Glen asked.

"Nothin' for you to hear." The witcher looked away. "Well Glen, I'd say you've given me just enough info for us to be all friend-like".

"So... I can go?"

"Ha!" Fang barked. "That's a good try, but no. You're a friend of mine now Glen, and all my friends stay with me in Oerba." The witch hunter's face fell, but Fang ignored him and turned to face Noel. "Escort my new friend back, Noel. And remember, he's my friend now, so no gutting."

Noel shot her a dark look; Fang knew they'd be having words later. It was all worth it for the utterly bloodless complexion of the witch hunter as Noel guided him out of the camp.

"And send some people over to pick up all these horses!" she called out. She could just make out the quiet rustle of the two stepping into the undergrowth, before she was alone, just two cooling corpses and some horses for company. Slowly, she looked over the campsite. She'd taken the first step towards finding a name, but that didn't mean there wasn't something else hiding. And she couldn't know for sure until the entire campsite had been stripped bare of secrets.

She just needed a name. As soon as she had that…

 _I'm going to tear down the sky and smother them with it._

* * *

 _That's the chapter. Let me know how you felt about it, because I wasn't wholly confident in the direction I took it. If you're enjoying the story, consider following my tumblr here:_ _orderlyanarchist tumblr com/ (add the .s)_

 _I tend to post chapter previews there as well as status updates on how chapters are progressing. Plus you can ask me whatever you want there, and I'll publicly answer you._


	4. Dare to Hope?

_Hi all! Sorry for the long delay. The last few weeks have been traumatic. I might be off schedule for a little while longer while I do my best to practice for the upcoming magic RPTQ and sort my way through all this other nonsense I'm going on. Continued thanks goes to the usual cast, and I still don't own any of these creative properties. This chapter is dedicated to Cocoa, who was the best dog anyone could ever know. I'll miss you so much girl._

* * *

"I thought you might still be here."

The dim glow of the rising sun illuminated the smouldering remains of a campfire and the the ransacked campsite surrounding it. Freshly dismantled tents were piled into a heap of crumpled canvas, their wooden frames extracted and laid out in rows for the purpose of salvage. Several cracked open chests were haphazardly scattered about the area, their shattered locks discarded and their contents loosely organized into piles of foodstuff and drink, shoddy weapons, and all manner of miscellany. Blood stained the ground in several places, soaked into the compacted earth and staining it even blacker.

Faint tendrils of smoke wound ethereal trails into the sky, lingering echoes of the charred remnants of the fire. Fang stood alone before the sunken pit, her gaze upturned, eyes tracking the curling wisps as they crept ever higher and disappeared into the unending reaches of the sky, fading into a forgotten nothingness. She was still clad in the traditional armour of her school, itself just as well remembered as the smoke vanishing into the heavens. Bloodstains splashed across the old armour, a little of it hers, but almost all of it not. In fashion atypical of a witcher, only a single sword was slung over her back, gleaming silver for the more monstrous of her foes. For steel, she carried a lance, adorned with vicious blades at each end of the staff. Both weapons seemed out of place amongst the common-place swords and spears piled around several chests, of make refined and exquisitely maintained. She held a ragged looking book in her right hand, her left shielding her skyward gaze from the radiance of the climbing sun.

"Fang?"

This time the witcher turned to face her, and for a fleeting moment she was perfectly framed by the cresting sun, the shining half-visible star anointing her with a half-formed halo. Her hair was as wild as it had ever been, but the kiss of the sun highlighted the crimson pinpricks that streaked her unruly mane. In that flicker of time, Vanille was seized by a notion that Fang could be a holy avenger, dispatched by the highest orders of the gods to serve their justice.

Fang stepped forward, and the illusion shattered as the sun rushed to hide behind the protection of her leather and chainlink armour.

"I knew you'd come lookin' for me eventually," Fang said, her voice warm with affection. "I never could keep away from you for very long."

"Well we are sisters after all!" Vanille affirmed, bright and cheery. She pushed the image of the sun-haloed avenger out of mind and focused on her sister. For all her witcher training and mutations, Fang was a distinctly feminine woman. Even the wide scar that cut a savage diagonal line across her left cheek and the splattered discolouring scars of acid burn visible across her throat couldn't detract from that. There was a spark in her emerald eyes that spoke of determination and mischief in equal measure, a fitting companion to the wry smirk she always seemed to be wearing.

Would that she could rekindle that spark as bright as she'd seen it before.

"You've got that right," Fang agreed. Vanille couldn't react fast enough, as the witcher's free hand lashed out to ruffle her hair. She let out an indignant squeak as Fang mussed up her hair even worse than it had been before.

"Fannng!" Vanille protested. She tried to retaliate, to no avail. The witcher stood several heads taller than her.

"Nuh uh," Fang rebuffed, easily slapping Vanille's grasping hands away. "Hair mussin' is an exclusive big sister's privilege."

"Fine," Vanille huffed, stamping one foot into the ground. Her eyes caught on the book still clenched in the witcher's right hand. "Oh!" she exclaimed, indignation quickly forgotten. "Did you find anything?"

"Not much." The witcher looked away, briefly reaching over her shoulder to clench the shaft of her lance. She exhaled, releasing her grip. "I know they met a middleman in a tavern in the capital, and I know the tavern is apparently named after some woman." She held out her right hand, offering the weathered-looking book. Vanille snatched it from her grip, immediately cracking it open to one of the middle pages. "One of them kept a diary," Fang continued, "but it's full of sexual fantasies and not much else."

Vanille flicked through a few pages, grimacing in disgust. She quickly handed back the book before wiping her hands off against her trousers. "Yuck. Was there _anything_ useful?"

"Well he did write about a sensuous vixen joining their party in the midst of their travels. I looked for more, but beyond that he only writes of all the different ways he might bed her."

"Hmm... " Vanille was contemplative for a moment, before a revelation struck. "Lebreau's a sensuous vixen! You should talk to her!"

"Lebreau…" Fang frowned. "Wasn't she the one who shot me?"

Vanille shrugged, unwilling to dim her wide smile. "I'm sure she's sorry. Come on!" She grabbed Fang's free hand and set about tugging her out of the camp and into the woods.

Fang stared, bemused, as the the sorceress pulled ineffectually at her arm, huffing and groaning with exaggerated exertion. A low chuckle built in her throat as Vanille utterly failed to move her.

"Fannng," Vanille whined. "Come on!"

"Fine, fine." Fang sighed, long and deeply embellished as she allowed the redhead to drag her into motion. "Y'know most folks wouldn't believe the things I put up with from you."

"It's because you love me," Vanille drawled, drawing out the o.

"You're damn right I do sister, but you could stand to abuse it a little less."

"Hmph." Vanille pouted. "Where would be the fun in that?" she asked, slowly picking a course back to the village through the dense woods. She bit back a curse as a thin branch snagged against her blouse and snapped the offending limb with a sharp twist and jerk. Fang just smirked, letting as much of the short journey as she could pass by in amicable silence as they navigated their way back to Oerba.

Vanille never could stand for silence. She looked back, taking in Fang's easy smirk and the way she seemed focused on nothing in particular. "So…" she started, breaking the silence and ignoring the way Fang knowingly snickered. "I noticed you're taking more of an interest in Noel lately. He's cute."

Fang sighed, loudly.

"Well he is!" Vanille protested. "He's got a nice smile and you know those baggy pants are hiding something."

"Vanille, you're a bloody incorrigible minx sometimes, y'know that?"

"Yep!" Vanille chirped her agreement.

Fang groaned. "Well if you're gonna jump the guy, do it when I'm not around to hear you, yeah?"

"No promises!" Vanille bounced backwards to carry on adjacent to the witcher, offering her a sly, sidelong look. "Besides," she continued. "You still haven't told me why you're interested in him."

Fang's disappointed gaze almost froze her. "You didn't notice? He's a bloody werewolf, Vanille, and a damned strange one at that. It's my job to be interested in him."

Vanille scoffed. "Well clearly he hid it well. You know I only notice the obvious signs."

Fang nodded her acknowledgement. "He's hidden it very well," she conceded. "I think he has control - at least a little. I've never seen a werewolf with control myself, but I've read about special cases. Noel could be one of them."

The flickering light of the torches began to faintly peek through the gaps in the foliage, the first indication of their nearing proximity to the village they'd come to call home. The discrepancy in light was hardly detectable amidst the building glow of the dawn; Vanille decided she would be sure to stifle them on their way back into the village. The sounds of the waking settlement carried across to them, quiet against all that distance but growing steadily in volume as they approached. It already sounded busier than she would have expected, but with all the damage dealt by the prior night's attack, she supposed it was to be expected that Oerba would want as much a head start as possible on the repairs.

Those repairs were something Vanille had pondered heavily in the long night that followed the raid. Many of Oerba's able-bodied residents would be busy with hunting and crafting the meat and materials they required for the approaching winter, so progress with the repairs would likely be slower going than anyone was comfortable with. Unfortunately, Oerba had a very limited population to recruit from. But if they were going to keep a half-dozen people perfectly capable of working in detainment…

"What do you think of community service?" Vanille asked as they stepped past the treeline and into the cleared fields that marked the outermost limits of the village.

Fang looked at her curiously, though she didn't so much as pause in her stride. "I'd say we already do plenty of it."

"I don't mean for us," Vanille groused. "I mean for all those prisoners we have sitting around. If we just have them fix the damage they did in the first place, it works in everybody's interests."

"And how do you figure that?" Fang asked, doubtful.

"Free labour for us, and none of them gets lynched. Because you know if those buildings aren't standing again in time for winter than somebody's getting lynched."

"So you wanna trust a bunch of witch hunters to help out around the village?" Fang laughed. "Doubt they have so much as a helpful bone in their bodies. I say if Oerba wants to hang 'em, let 'em."

Vanille had long ago accepted that in matters of safety, she was more than content to let Fang have her way in decisions. Today however, she felt oddly insistent about it. "Well I think it's a good idea," Vanille assured her, mustering the brightest smile she could.

Fang just shrugged. "If you say so. But I'll be putting the fear of the gods in them first."

"I hardly think that will be necessary," Vanille said, accentuating the point with a quiet giggle. "They're already terrified of everything that so much as looks at them. I swear the new one you found thought Noel was going to eat him.

Fang let out a sharp bark of laughter, startling several birds into flight and drawing confused gazes from a pair of villagers as they entered the outskirts of Oerba proper. "That-" another fit of laughter overpowered her as she fought to recover a straight face. "That may have been my fault. That one's a new _friend_ ," she managed to explain.

"Fang no!" Vanille was aghast. "Noel doesn't even have a ghost of a reputation! You can't ruin that by making him a part of your _friendly_ intimidation tactics!"

"Eh." Fang waved away her concerns as she fought of the lingering remnants of her amusement, forcing a serious expression that didn't fool Vanille in the slightest. "It'll hardly hurt him. It might not seem it, but he'll want people telling those stories. The more tales people have to tell of you, the less likely it is that anyone'll know the truth. People will be so busy trying to separate fact from fake that if they actually see you, you can force 'em to take you at face value. You want people to think they know your secrets. Then when they're lookin' for someone with a specific secret to hide, they'll skim right over you. Folk are always lookin' for the wolf in sheep's clothing; they never notice the wolf dressed up as a hunting dog in town square."

Vanille's face twisted with distaste. "That's so convoluted I can't tell whether it's even wise."

"It works," Fang insisted. Her expression fell slightly. "Oerba's rare in these parts. Most places here take kinder to a murderin' merc than a wandering witcher."

"Well," Vanille started, her voice still cheery as she skipped ahead so she could turn to face her. She leaned forward, one hand resting on her hip as she offered another bright smile. "We'll just have to change their minds then!"

Fang chuckled, shaking her head as she brushed past the sorceress. She seized Vanille's hand at the last moment as she passed, and Vanille let out an undignified yelp as she felt herself be suddenly yanked backwards. "Don't ever lose that optimism," Fang said. "Who knows where I'd be without it." She paused suddenly, as though remembering something, and Vanille stumbled right on into her back. "Wasn't there-?"

"Lebreau?" Vanille suggested, pushing herself away from where she'd inadvertently plastered herself against the witcher's back.

"Right." Fang sighed. She lingered for a moment as Vanille turned about to skip off in a different direction, her feet feeling a stone's weight heavier as she reluctantly followed the younger sorceress. "We'll get this over with, but I'm telling you there ain't nothing good to come from negotiatin' with witch hunters."

"Oh, Lebreau's not a witch hunter," Vanille explained, almost dismissively. "Well not really. She owns a tavern in sanctum!"

The witcher was dubious. "And she told you this when?" Fang demanded. Then as an afterthought: "And you believed her?"

"Well not right away," Vanille reluctantly admit. "But that journal validated a surprising amount of her story. She was working hard fixing the damage to the buildings in the square, and I was bored, so I figured why not chat? And she was fun to talk to." Vanille turned suddenly fixing Fang with an impish smirk. "Fun to look at too!"

"And I suppose her working on repairs rather than sitting lonely in a cell where she's supposed to be was more fun for you too?" Fang didn't look particularly happy with the sorceress's independently arranged initiative. Vanille shrugged.

"Don't be a hypocrite," she scolded. "You're the one who showed me how much simpler it was to ask forgiveness than permission."

"That-" Fang exhaled, breath hissing raggedly through tightly pursed lips. "Well I hope you know what you're doing." She released a frustrated huff, stomping ahead of her towards the direction of the village square. "Turnin' my insolence against me like that - it ain't right."

Vanille needed to jog to keep up with the witcher's long steps. "Well I learned from the best." She poked Fang in the side, pouting when she didn't even seem to notice through the unyielding surface of her armour.

"Quiet you." Fang slapped at Vanilles prodding finger, knocking the digit and the hand it was attached to well away from her. "Stop makin' me feel like a bad influence."

Vanille decided to let Fang stew in silence for a bit, skipping forward to maintain pace with her frustrated strides and choosing not to say anything until the sight of the reconstruction effort finally came into view. When she saw how much progress had already been made, Vanille knew Fang wouldn't be able to help but be impressed.

She'd only actually convinced a few of the hopefully ex-witch hunters to agree to help with the repairs while the rest chose wasting away in a cell as the preferable alternative to assisting a village that would aid and abet witches. Fortunately, those she did convince seem to throw themselves into the work with surprising zeal. She liked to think it was a product of some desperate desire to make amends, but realistically Vanille knew they were probably just doing all they could to ingratiate themselves to her and the village so she might send them home sooner than later. Ultimately their motivations mattered less than their results, and they _were_ showing results.

At the moment, work was focused on the least damaged of the three buildings ravaged by the fire. That particular building had suffered mostly internal damage, and while the inside of the building was a total ruin of blackened char and smoke damage, the actual structure of the building remained sound, albeit rather blackened in quite a few places. She saw Lebreau and Hope working with a handful of locals to repair and replace the scorched thatching of the roof, the densely packed straw and grasses having suffered greatly for their role in containing the raging inferno. The large sprawl of blackened furniture and other items led Vanille to believe the other were probably inside, cleaning out the interior.

"Lebreau!" she called out, her voice lilting to its upper register as she looked to seize the other woman's attention. She giggled as Lebreau's head snapped up from whatever it was working on and immediately lurched in her direction. Hope's gaze quickly followed, and she met the boy's uncertain expression with a soft smile. It wasn't easy to believe he'd stabbed Fang in the back just the night prior.

"Vanille? Do you need something?" The woman sounded exhausted, though she made a valiant effort to hide it. It hardly surprised her. Although it turned out Fang hadn't actually left the woman concussed, her armoured fists had still been far from gentle. The situation left Vanille altogether impressed that the woman continued to work as hard as she did in spite of it.

"We just wanted to chat for a bit," Vanille called back, discreetly glancing to her right to make sure Fang wasn't trying to murder anybody with her eyes. The witcher just looked bored now, which Vanille supposed was more than satisfactory, if not ideal. Fang also didn't seem interested in adding to the conversation, so Vanille took it upon herself to speak for her. "Fang has some questions," she elaborated. "But she promises she won't punch you again!"

"I promise nothing," Fang muttered, so quietly that even Vanille barely heard her. The sorceress chose not to dignify the remark with a reply, shaking her head in disbelief. And Fang claimed to be the older sister. Hope was staring at the witcher with nervous eyes, as though he was afraid she'd throw her lance at him with only a moment's notice.

Lebreau briefly glanced back at the section of roofing she was currently labouring over, pondering it for a moment before she replied. "Could you give us another half hour to finish up here?" she asked. "It's looking like it might rain soon, and dealing with the internal fire damage will be work enough without flooding and water damage tossed into the mix."

Although initially put off by the unexpected answer, a quick look to her right prompted Vanille to reconsider. Perhaps that was the best response Lebreau could have offered. Fang cocked her head to the side, her expression curious and seemingly devoid of malice, prompting Vanille to recall the value Fang had always ascribed to honest working. Vanille felt a surge of satisfaction; her plan might just come together after all.

For a moment, Fang seemed content with looking pensive, taking a long moment's pause before she called back up to the roof. "You think an extra pair of hands might make that work go faster?"

To her tremendous credit, Lebreau only hesitated for a moment before offering up a nonchalant shrug. "I imagine so," she said.

Vanille could only smile as Fang took a running start towards the side of the building, completely ignoring the ladder set up at the opposite side as she took several climbing steps up the wall, launching herself upwards and catching the edge of the roof-frame with her fingers. Her grip was iron, and Fang hauled herself up and onto the roof unassisted, and Vanille laughed when she saw Hope's eyes go wide as dishes, the poor kid stunned by the sight of the witcher easily pulling herself onto the roof as though she wasn't carrying another hundred or so pounds worth of weapons and armour on her back.

This could definitely work, she thought once more. Fang was nodding her approval as Lebreau explained the few tasks remaining on the roof. Hope finally tore his gaze away from her, refocusing on his task as he diligently returned to laying out the thatching for his section of the roof.

Fang was soon settled easily, if not comfortably beside the one-time witch hunter, putting the final touches of the rooftop repairs into place, and despite the potential danger and gravity of their current situation, Vanille was hopeful.

* * *

Lightning wasn't hopeful. Burned to cinders it may have been, but the enigmatic missive responsible for dragging her into the depths of the Gapra at a truly ungodly hour of the night remained a permanent presence within her mind. It should have been easy to ignore. A message amounting to 'come to the forest, come alone, come at night' raised more red flags than it contained words; had it been a normal missive, written in the halting northern dialect that was the norm for this backwater kingdom, she would have. But a letter written in Zerrikanian script was something that demanded a certain degree of respect; she'd departed the desert kingdom with Serah alone, and though Lightning could never speak for her sister, she'd been herself more than tightlipped about about her origins since their arrival.

It was easy to justify her curiosity then. If somebody knew her background, it was logical to meet with them. She needed a better read on the situation, and she needed control over the flow of that information. She'd have neither of those things if she didn't follow through. So now she was alone in deep Gapra, awaiting a clandestine encounter with someone who knew more than they should. She leaned back against a massive fir tree, her discerning eyes peering into the murky shadows surrounding her for the first sign of approaching trouble. For all her curiosity, Lightning estimated the odds of no one dying tonight to be... low.

To anybody looking, she'd appear relaxed, casually leaning back against the wide trunk of an ancient evergreen with her hands crossed behind her back and her half-closed eyes only just peeking out from under her hood. She was clad in her modified combat leathers, the protective ensemble trading resistance against direct blows for significant advantages in mobility and speed. The leather was form-fitting, moulded in the shape of her body to minimize any impediments to her movement. Its combination of sharp white and sandy brown colouring was poor camouflage in the greenery of the moonlit forest, which was of mild concern, though she was perfectly confident that her skills in combat could compensate for those disadvantages.

Still, beneath the guise of relaxation, Lightning was anything but distracted or vulnerable. Her relaxed muscles were ready to spring into violent action with only a moment's notice, and crossing her hands behind her back allowed her fingers to invisibly grasp along the hilt of her prized saber, Blazefire. Keeping her eyes half-lidded and largely hidden by the shadow of her hood concealed the hyperawareness of her gaze, as she continued to carefully and unwaveringly scan for any sign of out of place action or movement. If someone was looking to ambush her, they'd found the perfect lure to do so. She'd make sure they didn't live to share their findings.

When an even deeper black finally brow the symmetry of the shadows, Lightning reacted immediately; her eyes distinguished a humanoid figure, shrouded by a heavy blackened cloak, concealed amidst the surrounding murk. Her loose grasp on Blazefire's hilt tightened, and Lightning focused her attention on the individual now approaching her, though she didn't dare fully divert herself fully from the rest of her surroundings. She raised her left hand in a terse greeting, keeping her right hidden behind her back as she carefully edged Blazefire partway out of its sheath. The stranger was clad in what amounted to rags, Lightning could see as she grew closer, but they moved with the delicate and measured footsteps of a practiced hunter. A roughly hewn bow was slung across their back, accompanied by a quiver of hand-fletched arrows. Lightning could also make out the notched skinning knife jutting out from a deep pocket in the hunter's cloak. She didn't lower her guard for a moment, but she was admittedly curious. She lowered her right hand.

"That's close enough," Lightning said, her eyes searching the stranger for some clue towards their identity. The hunter paused, acquiescing to the command before shrugging back her hood in a single easy motion. Tangled blond locks cascaded a short ways down the hunter's back and her face was marred with splotches of dirt and grime. Her facial features were sharp and her eyes were clear; she tried to discern their colour, but the combination of shadows and distance made that task rather impossible. Then the hunter offered her the smallest of smiles, and Lightning couldn't fight the feeling that there was something alarmingly familiar about the way the woman's lips quirked ever-so-slightly upwards in a disarming rendition of a smirk. Lightning could feel an entire conversation within that gesture, the hunter suggesting that she knew something rather valuable - something that Lightning herself did not. Perhaps that explained the familiarity. Lightning was hardly a stranger to dealing with information brokers and others of their ilk.

Still, there was strangeness to the feeling, multiplied in its gravity by the absence of accompanying discomfort. Her intuition told her that something was off, but it didn't tell her that anything was wrong, and her intuition was a voice she'd long learned to pay credence to.

"Lightning," the hunter said, her voice cool and authoritative.

And Lightning couldn't fight the way her eyes ever so briefly widened as the situation finally came together in her head. "Nabaat?" And when she put the pieces together in her head, it like perhaps it wasn't so shocking after all. She was surprised that Jihl Nabaat had been so quick to dispense with the pretenses.

"Guilty," Eden's spymaster admitted, smiling in a way that didn't seem to meet her eyes. "I see my words were well received."

"Well enough. What do you want?"

"Always so straight and to the point," Jihl remarked. "I've always found that strange. You know I have a certain fondness for Zerrikanian script. They say the scribe who crafted it sought his inspiration from dragons; the individual characters sweep and dive as they do. It's a shame I don't find more opportunities to use it."

Lightning took a deep breath. "Is there a point to this Jihl?"

She shook her head. "Hardly, but spare me a moment to express my fascination that a woman like you could write such gracefully curving script, wield such a graceful curving weapon, and physically - excuse my tact - bear the curve of an hourglass, and yet in all other things be as straight and unyielding as a bar of steel."

"Call it compensation if it satisfies you; if it's all the same, I'd rather we reach the root of this meeting sooner than later."

"If you keep looking straight ahead like that and you'll miss the roses for the weeds. I think that's the expression? I'm not as well versed in metaphors as I'd like to be." She seemed to finally notice the glare Lightning was fixing her with, releasing a drawn-out sigh before she continued. "You could stand to take my words more seriously. This unending nescience of yours is unbecoming."

"What?"

"Lightning, I will give you every iota of respect you deserve for your skills in combat, but when you continue to place your trust in Galenth Dysley, you make it increasingly obvious that your use as a tool is painfully limited to a martial capacity."

Lightning scoffed. "Dysley has never had my trust."

"I'm sure you'd like to believe that," Jihl mused. "Then you'd do well to trust him even less."

"Tch." The tips of Lightning's fingers traced the grooves of Blazefire's hilt. "And I suppose I should trust you instead?"

Jihl smiled widely. "I suppose if you wanted to prove my point, you could do that. If you wanted to start using that pretty head of yours for something other than scoffing and glaring, trusting me would be the worst start you could imagine." She paused. "Or perhaps not. Your imagination is one thing I can't claim to know, so I strongly believe it would be at least top three."

Lightning shrugged. "I could probably imagine worse. And I know where you're taking this. There's something you think you can do for me; I shouldn't trust you, but I should trust in your ability to help me, though not your reasons as to why? Is that about right?"

"It's close enough." Jihl leaned slightly forward, cupping her mouth with one hand as if to mime a whisper. "Galenth Dysley can't help your sister," she said. Lightning shifted uncomfortably, but Jihl ignored it as she continued on. "Or perhaps he can but won't. Either way, I think you'd do well to acquire new services."

"I suppose it shouldn't surprise me that you know about her," Lightning conceded. A creeping sensation of unease seemed to crawl up her spine. That was a secret she'd been meticulous in preserving. "And if I asked how you knew, I suppose you wouldn't tell me."

The spymaster gave her a strange look. "You're getting better already. Don't worry about it overmuch. Secrets lose all their value when you share them. Besides, I'm not just here to suggest you find a new tool - I'm also here to recommend one. I'm sure you've realized by now that Galenth Dysley is a tool suited towards no one's needs but his own."

Steel whispered against leather as Lightning finally slipped Blazefire fully secure back into its sheath.

"I'm listening."

"Perfect." Jihl reached into one of the pockets of her cloak, retrieving a small slip of paper. "You see, I happen to know of a specialist in the fields of both monsters and curses, gone to ground in the wake of Dysley's incessant purging."

Lightning resisted the urge to glare. "I hope you don't expect me to find her for you. I don't specialize in finding people who don't want to be found."

"Oh, nothing so difficult." Jihl shook her head dismissively, the wryest of smiles creeping its way across her face as she handed Lightning the slip of paper.

Lightning examined the slip, flipping it over several times as she tried to find anything other than blank space scrawled on its surface. "There's nothing here," she said after a moment, when she was certain she hadn't overlooked any strange secret.

"Oh I just have a terrible habit of handing out cards when arranging meetings. These days it seems nobody has them, so I just hand out blank ones. Don't mind me. Besides, I've already taken the liberty of extending them an invitation I'm quite sure they won't refuse. All you'll need to do is wait to receive them."

Lightning cocked her head. "And that would be when?"

"Oh they'll come on their own time, I imagine, and sooner rather than later I'm sure. It's nothing worth worrying over. You'll know them when you meet them." That seemed to trigger the end of the conversation for the spymaster, because she quickly turned away to depart for the shadows of the Gapra.

"Wait!" Lightning called out. Jihl paused, craning her neck to look back over her shoulder. "You just expect me to recognize them? How?"

Jihl laughed. "With your eyes perhaps? Or your ears if it pleases you?" She exhaled. "You were doing so well. Still…" she was moving again, almost fading from view completely as she stepped back into the shadows. "Let no one say I'm without my generosity. I imagine you'll know them best when they try to kill you. Who else would dare?" Then Eden's spymaster was gone, and Lightning was alone in the wood once more. Her shoulders shook. No one had talked down to her like that since her mother. She withdrew Blazefire from its sheath in a single smooth motion, holding the blade in front of her so she could face its cutting edge. Several sparks raced down the blades length, and Lightning finally let herself break into quiet laughter.

"Straight and unyielding," she said to the saber. "Tch. I suppose we'll see."

And Blazefire hummed, electricity surging across the full length of its meticulously honed edge.

* * *

 _Writing Lightning is hard. Special thanks goes to XalkXolc for making me rewrite her entire section so her and Jihl weren't just awful." Follow me on my tumblr (_ _orderlyanarchist tumblr com) for previews and updates. You ask me there for leave a review here if there's any comments you want to make or any questions you want answered._


	5. Knock-off Dragon from the Discount Store

_This isn't dead I swear. Also my computer and more importantly my keyboard is fixed so I don't have any more excuses to put off typing. I still think not wanting to type when half your keys don't work is a fair excuse though. Anyway I'm less of a mess now and I should have a good amount of free time to work on this, so while I won't promise the return of a schedule - I'm so so so bad at those - I will promise a much shorter wait between chapters than the last one. That was uhh... That was my bad._

 _Anyway thanks goes to the usual crowd for beta-ing and the usual disclaimers of me not owning anything witcher or FF13 related are also present. Hope y'all enjoy. Sorry again about the wait._

* * *

"I suppose the marksmanship came with the tavern?"

The woman chose to ignore Fang's unspoken accusation, and the witcher resisted the urge to glower as she carefully layered some of the last clumps of fresh thatching into place. Lebreau was inspecting her own handiwork, prodding at it in several places as she continued to look entirely unperturbed by Fang's attempts at interrogation. Fang briefly pondered the merits of unsheathing Kain's lance to see if that would grab the other woman's attention, but Vanille was still watching from below and she didn't think she could construe it in a way that wouldn't see a lecture on hospitality consuming the rest of her morning.

"Y'know," she tried, "Before today I'd definitely have put you down as one for small talk."

The other woman finally turned to acknowledge her, but she only shrugged. "Not on the job. Can't stand for a faulty roof just because I was distracted by idle chit chat."

Well fuck. She could hardly look to contradict that.

"It looks like we're almost done up here though. If you can pack that last layer of thatching in-" she pointed towards another section of the roof not all that far away from her "- there'll be plenty of time for our talk after."

Fang was already halfway finished packing it into place when she realized: _Did I just let her give me orders?_ She glanced back, unwilling to open her mouth and thus admit to anything and Lebreau met her gaze like there wasn't a single thing amiss.

Damnable woman. Fang briefly entertained the notion of a tragic roofing accident marked by an unsurvivable fall to the cold, hard earth below. Eventually she determined that her pride wasn't worth suffering through Vanille's disappointment. Still, that didn't make it any less pleasant of a thought.

The last bits of work were finished quickly. Fang fixed Lebreau with a severe look, and the woman nodded her acknowledgement even as she brought up her arm to wipe away the sweat dripping from her brow. "I'll meet you below," Fang said. "Don't be too long." She briefly glanced towards the ladder set up at the other end of the building. She shook her head, her lips curving into a wild grin as she instead leapt off the edge of the roof with wild abandon. She heard a few cries of alarm sound out, but Fang ignored them as she tucked her head in and hit the ground with a smooth roll, dispersing her downward momentum in a forward tumble across the compact ground. She quickly came to an easy stop beside her sister, rolling into a sturdy crouch as she came up steady on her own two feet. Vanille just shook her head.

"You're ridiculous."

Fang smiled impishly, standing taller as she fiddled with the weapons on her back, adjusting them from where they'd shifted just slightly out of place. "Just keeping up appearances," she said, nonchalant.

"Soothing your bruised pride, more like," Vanille muttered. Fang chose to pretend she didn't hear it.

"Your new friends will be here soon," Fang said. "I hope you didn't forget what they are."

"Fang…"

"Nuh uh missy. You can do all the forgivin' you want, but at least one of us needs to stay sensible. You're just lucky you've got me to look after you."

Vanille huffed. "I'm not a child, Fang."

"No, but you are too quick to see the good in people. It's endearing, but it'll get you killed if you're not careful. That's what I'm here for."

"Or maybe you're just too stubborn to let go of stupid grudges," Vanille shot back.

"Stupid? 'Nille they'd have strung you up and paraded you through the streets like a bloody trophy, then tied you to a stake and burned you alive."

"And you know that for a fact?" Vanille demanded. "There's something off here Fang. There's more to this than we know, but you're too scared to look into it!"

"Scared?" Fang demanded. "You've got some-"

"So… Is this a bad time?"

Fang whirled around, fixing the new arrival with the harshest glare she could muster. "Nah, it's the perfect time. Pull up a chair while I fetch the tea and crackers." Lebreau looked as relaxed as anything, though the boy seemed to be doing his very best to hide behind her.

"I see we've already reached the defensive sarcasm stage," Vanille muttered under her breath.

"Oi! That's enough out of you," Fang growled. "Let's cut to the chase, yeah? I've been around more than long enough to tell a merc from a barmaid, so toss out the pretenses and tell me who hired you and why they saddled you with these clowns."

Lebreau's eyes widened, her mouth briefly opening into the shape of an O before she snapped it shut and regained her composure. That was good. It means Fang wasn't off her mark.

"Well... " the woman started. "You've got some things right. I don't suppose you've ever heard of NORA?" Fang shook her head. "We were a mercenary outfit, for a while. We were a damn good one too. We're in the tavern business now though, and it's honest to the gods not a front."

Fang laughed. "You're saying you just... put down the swords to start serving drinks?"

She nodded, her expression serious. "Aye. Us and every other merc with more than rocks in their head. These days, freelancer work is a death sentence. You'd be lucky to survive a month taking on the contracts people are putting out now."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Fang asked, unable to keep some of her hostility from morphing itself into honest curiosity.

"Eden's frontiers are just about completely taken over by monsters now, and their moving further inward every day. Everybody's fleeing towards the big cities, and every mercenary contract you'll find involves reclaiming what's been lost. NORA was good - great even - but what's out there now? It's above our paygrade. Doesn't help much that these days they're like as not to hang you for packing silver, and taking on a leshen with steel? That's suicide." Fang's expression twisted into a grimace. Fighting a leshen was touch and go when you were a witcher and prepared. The mental image of a bunch of mercenaries hacking at the monster with steel didn't end pretty. Still, several details of the self-proclaimed ex-mercenary's tale stood out to her.

"You know your terminology," Fang said, reluctantly impressed. "Not many out there who know the right name for a leshen. Still, I don't know what they expected after blowin' up Haerii. The whole reason us witchers came out here was 'cause old man Raines needed us to keep the frontiers clear. Probably shoulda thought of that before he knocked over our fortress, y'know, since he's the one who gave us the damn thing in the first place."

Lebreau held up her hands. "Affairs of the crown? Also above my paygrade. We worked a few jobs with a witcher in the past, and he seemed a good enough sort. Shared his silver, though I don't think he ever paid for a drink."

Fang almost asked his name. Almost. She was quick to remember just what sort she was dealing with; she was hardly going to fall prey to taking statements at face value. "Hell of a way to repay a friend, wasn't it?" she asked instead. "Coming out here to hunt for witchers."

Lebreau sighed. "I said I was out of the merc life and I meant it. The last time I saw these ones in the capital I was busy kicking the lot of them out of Nora house for making a scene. Mercs dressing up like those lunatics from the west, chasing after mages? That's business I wanted no part of. But this one -" she gestured at Hope, standing quietly at her side. He looked away, unwilling to meet anybody's eyes. "This one thought he'd go make a name for himself or something, and ran off with them the moment I turned my back. A… mutual acquaintance of ours would flay me alive if anything happened to him, so I didn't have much choice in the matter after that. Caught up with the group a few days out from the city, and they weren't keen to let me drag him back. So… here I am. Didn't do such a good job keeping him out of trouble, did I? Guess I'm more used to looking after adults who behave like children than the real thing." She chuckled. "It might actually me in my best interests if you don't let me go. Angry Lightning is something I'm even less keen to face than a leshen."

"You sound like you don't expect me to believe you," Fang remarked.

Lebreau shrugged. "I did shoot you."

Fang's eyes narrowed. "Believe me. I haven't forgotten."

"Then maybe I can make it up to you." Fang cocked her head. "The leader of this gang met with someone while the rest were busy flipping tables in my bar. NORA ran a few contracts for the crown before the frontiers all went to hell, and the man she was meeting with was the same guy who handled one of our contracts. Smarmy bastard - I wouldn't trust him farther than I could throw him, but he's definitely a man who's royally employed. I can't tell you where to find him now, but if you go to Nora House in the capital and tell a guy named Yuj that Lebreau sent you, he'll supply you with all the details you should need to find him. Tracking things is what you witchers are best at, right?"

Fang tapped a finger against the blade of her lance. "Not quite, but it's up there." She thought for a moment. "Now I like a lot of what you're suggestin', except for the part where it demands a damned sight more trust than I'm willing to give you."

Lebreau leaned back, drawing out a long sigh as she rolled back her shoulders. "Look, I just want to go home before the rest of the NORA crew gets it in their head to do something stupid like trying to launch a rescue mission. They're family, for the better or the worse of it. They would do that sort of thing."

Fang turned away, resisting the urge to grind her heel into the earth. She wished more than anything to be back out in the wilds, twirling her silver as she put down the monsters lurking in the shadows - the simple, one-dimensional monsters whose motivations were rarely more nuanced than a besital desire to rend her limb from limb. She looked towards Vanille. "Well? What do you think?"

Vanille shook her head. "I still believe her, but Fang that's too risky. If anybody figures out who you are…"

Fang nodded, turning back to face the apparent part-mercenary, part-barmaid, part-babysitter. She looked her over carefully, watching as the woman's fingers fiddled with the hem of her shirt, belying her discomfort at baring the full weight of the witcher's gaze. "Well," Fang finally said. "Where exactly is your Nora House?"

"Fang!" Vanille exclaimed. "Why do you ever bother asking when you're never going to listen?"

Fang grinned. "Just had to make sure _you_ had _your_ head screwed on straight before I decided to do something monumentally crazy."

* * *

Despite the whirlwind of different thoughts and ideas tearing through her head, Lightning did not allow herself to be distracted. Her senses remained focused on her surroundings, analyzing every oddly shaped shadow to ensure it wasn't something more sinister concealing itself within the darkness. While the Gapra had never exactly been safe - what untamed wilds were? - recent times had seen it become a great deal more dangerous, even throughout the short period since her arrival in Eden. Monsters continued to move inwards, their incursions largely unchecked, and while she didn't think she'd run into anything truly threatening this close to the capital, she also hadn't survived over the years by eschewing caution. Even if the woods came alive with the sudden and merciless fury of a leshen, Lightning would be ready.

In touch as she was with her surroundings, the sound of soldiers setting up camp did not escape her notice. She knew they were soldiers too. Average travelers didn't coordinate in verses of orders and synchronized choruses of "yes sir!" and while she didn't have eyes on their campsite, she would freely admit that the situation touched on her curiosity. So far the King's army had seemed quite adamant about not sending its soldiers chasing after monsters. She wondered if this meant they'd finally encroached deep enough that the crown could no longer ignore them.

She didn't intend to investigate. She was in fact in the midst of walking right on past the scene when the sound of a rather familiar voice, louder than the rest and obviously in charge, caught her attention. Lightning should have ignored it, but she couldn't help but feel just a little bit obligated to check it out, because while she wouldn't say she and GC lieutenant Rygdea were friends, he was one of the few soldiers stubborn enough to let Lightning continue to make a fool of him in sparring. Besides, with that man's track record he was like as not trying something exceedingly dangerous with a good chance of getting himself killed.

To his credit, he seemed to have brought good soldiers. One of the posted guards actually noticed as she crept out from under the cover of the treeline and into the small clearing the group had transformed into their temporary campsite.

"You there! Hold!" the watchman shouted.

Lightning paused. "I'd have words with your commander," she said.

The soldier seemed to recognize her then, because he said "Yes! Right ma'am! Of course!" and ran off to one of the tents set up near the outskirts of the clearing, on the far side from where she'd entered. Lighting shook her head. She didn't know why they always treated her like an officer; she was hardly a part of their chain of command. She held her place for the minute or so it took for the watchman to come running back, his superior officer strolling along rather leisurely behind him.

"Well I'll be," the officer exclaimed. "Lightning Farron herself, come out to play in the woods with us? What brings you here, girlie?"

Lightning stifled the beginnings of a smile. She supposed that treating her like an authority figure was still less irritating than the apparent alternative.

"Rygdea," Lightning said. "It's… good to see you."

Rygdea laughed. "Don't you lie to me, girlie. After all those times you thrashed me in the ring, I'd say I've at least earned the right to a little honesty."

She fought the smile harder. "Whatever you say, then." She glanced about, observing her surroundings, and her expression remained serious. "Is the army finally sending soldiers to fight off monster incursions?"

The officer chuckled, running a hand through his long, assuredly regulation-violating mop of ruddy brown hair. "Not exactly," he explained. "But Prince Raines finally decided to take things into his own hands. Started up his own regiment dedicated to tracking down and killing some of the bigger beasties giving our people trouble. Higher ups in the army have taken to calling us the cavalry. It's supposed to be a jab at Cid, about him not being willing to hop off his high horse, but we've pretty well embraced it. It's not a bad job, all in all. Nice to feel like we're actually doing something useful for once."

"I didn't know about this," Lightning admitted, taken slightly aback. Nabaat's words from earlier prodded at her, mocking.

"I'm not surprised. The king's advisor can't touch us, but he can pretend we don't exist." He smirked, looking back in the vague direction of the capital. "That's gotta rub ol' Galenth the wrong way, having something be beyond his control."

"I can imagine," Lightning agreed. It was refreshing to have someone talk to her without assuming everything they said would be relayed right back to the penitent sorcerer. "You're out here hunting then?"

Rygdea nodded. "As best we can, yeah. Got word of a dragon in the area." He laughed at the expression of disbelief that crossed Lightning's face. "Relax," he said. "There aren't any dragons in Eden. If I thought there was a dragon, I'd be taking my troops and running the opposite direction. I know what I'm fit for, and dragon slaying isn't it."

Lightning moulded her expression into nonchalance. "You should probably stop getting knocked around by me before you graduate to getting knocked around by a dragon." She cocked her head, curious. "But if you don't believe the rumours, why bother marching out?"

The soldier shrugged. "We brought down one of those wyvern things the other day. I wouldn't be surprised if another one of those is our dragon. Damned things are dangerous as all hell, but arrows and nets can ground them, and they die like anything else if you stick enough blades in them."

"I suppose they would. Doesn't it-" Lighting paused, the back of her neck prickling uncomfortably. Rygdea looked at her strangely, but kept his mouth shut when Lightning's gaze snapped around, scanning above, below, and in every other direction to locate the source of her disconcertment. There was a sense of pressure in the air, almost achingly familiar, but lurking on the edges of her senses. She reached for the feeling, almost burning with the frustration of her misrecognition. Then, suddenly, she felt it – the snap of sparks and the sudden shifting of the air.

"Move!" she shouted, launching herself forward and knocking the officer aside and to the ground with a full body tackle. She felt the searing heat as a stream of fire struck the space they'd occupied only moments prior. Lightning was back on her feet immediately, her eyes quickly locking on the shadowy shape veering through the sky above. A lack of forelegs distinguished it from the far grander creature reports had apparently claimed it to be, but she had no doubt that this was the cavalry's mark. She only hoped Rygdea's cavalry could hold together against the blazing ferocity of a slyzard.

"Damn it all!" Rygdea cursed, scampering to his feet as he strained to put a safe distance between himself and the burning earth behind them. "It really was a dragon?"

"Slyzard," Lightning corrected, from where she ran just ahead of him towards the center of the clearing. "They're fire-breathing wyverns, essentially. It's a common misconception."

"I can't imagine why," Rygdea growled. "Well you seem to know more about them than I do. How do we kill it?"

"Have your men spread out through the clearing – and keep them out of the forest! The last thing we need is a forest fire boxing us in. Harass it with arrows and try to drive it to the ground. If you can ground it, I'll take care of the rest."

He didn't challenge her. "Consider it done," he said, before veering off to bark orders and regain control of the situation. The cavalry reacted quickly, and it wasn't more than a few moments before a steady stream of arrows and bolts started lancing upward from the ground to try and strike the raging slyzard from the sky.

"Stay mobile!" Lightning shouted. "You stop moving, you die!" She drew her own small hand crossbow as the draconid swooped over her, briefly leading her target before letting the bolt fly upwards. Her lips quirked ever so slightly upwards when the projectile pierced through the vulnerable membrane of the slyzard's wing. Other projectiles found their mark too, though the majority passed harmlessly through the night sky, and the beast roared with fury as it blasted another gout of fire towards the ground below. Lightning watched as the scorching flames consumed a man who'd dropped to one knee to better aim his bow. She tuned out the agonized screaming that quickly followed.

She peppered the beast with crossbow bolts from below as she raced to keep underneath it, doing her best to earn the monster's ire and hopefully provoke the diving maneuvers so many rampaging draconids were fond of. The slyzard screeched as several more projectiles perforated its wings and pierced its rugged hide, and Lightning could just barely make out the drops of blood occasionally dripping from the monster's varied wounds as it continued to beat its powerful wings, angling them so as to veer around the edge of the clearing for another pass across. Its maw gaped open and Lightning immediately recognized the telltale glow as it readied another barrage, angling herself to better evade the incoming torrent. This time however, the slyzard eschewed sustained fire in favour of bombarding the ground with a series of high velocity fireballs, and Lightning had to throw herself into a desperate roll to avoid the nearest of them. The flames still managed to singe her scarf, the scorched crimson fabric trailing behind her like a cape after coming somewhat loose in the tumble. Several cries of agony suggested some of the projectiles had landed much closer to their marks, or perhaps their targets weren't quite so agile. The slyzard capitalized on the distraction, swooping low and lashing out with its tail, clipping one man on his side and slicing through his armour until it burst free in a terrible mess of blood.

"Nothing's working!" a nearby cavalry soldier cried, his voice tainted with panic. "We can't get it down!"

Lightning growled in frustration. "Give me that!" she snarled, as she yanked the man's bow from his trembling hands and tore the quiver from his back. She darted away, intent on bringing down the oversized flying lizard for good.

"Hey! That's mine!" the man protested pathetically. Lightning ignored him completely.

Nocking an arrow even as she ran, Lightning carefully tracked the slyzard's movement as it veered around again, following the exact same flight pattern as it had the pass prior. If it was planning to repeat the same maneuver as before…

Lightning loosed her arrow just as the slyzard finished banking out of its turn. It opened its mouth again, the fiery glow building once more to a crescendo – a crescendo cut short when the tip of an arrow buried itself in the roof of the monster's mouth. It lost control of its flames in dramatic fashion, the gathering fire violently exploding as the slyzard's concentration lapsed. The explosion itself inflicted little to no harm, but the force of it disrupted the slyzard's flight, robbing it of almost all forward momentum as it struggled to stay aloft. The beast snarled, outraged, and for the briefest moment, its eyes seemed to meet her own. Perhaps it was intelligent enough to recognize the bow she clasped as the source of the projectile, and Lightning as the one that had fired it. Perhaps its draconid instincts recognized something about her as more dangerous than the rest of its assailants. Perhaps its simplistic monster mind merely saw her as the closest target. Regardless, the moment after their eyes met, the slyzard swooped downwards, diving at her with unparalleled ferocity, claws outstretched as it sought to rend her limb from bloody limb. Lightning rolled to the side as it crashed down where she once stood, narrowly avoiding the slyzard's tail as it swept forward and struck at her. It swiped with its claws, and she hissed when one of its talons cut through her leather vambraces to carve a thin line into her arm.

She ignored the mild injury. The slyzard had finally grounded itself, however briefly, and was therefore at its most vulnerable. She would not fail to capitalize on the opportunity. Lightning darted forwards, Blazefire humming with life as she brought it to bear, and dipped under another swipe of the slyzard's claws before smoothly sidestepping a blow from its tail. She sliced at the tail with her saber as it harmlessly passed her by, her enchanted blade coming alive with electrical fury as it bit down into the monster's tough hide. She danced away almost as quick as she struck, narrowly avoiding the beast's retaliation as it threw itself forward and attempted to simply her crush her beneath the weight of its bulky draconid body. Lightning, however, was a maelstrom of motion, Blazefire striking in a dozen different places as the slyzard struggled to keep up with her nimble movements. The wounds she left were barely more than superficial – steel, even enchanted steel, always struggled to leave its mark on the more unnatural denizens of the world – but the cuts still dripped blood, and enough bleeding would eventually wear the monster out.

Perhaps more importantly, it would make the monster desperate. Lightning continued her dance, weaving and twirling through space, Blazefire an extension of herself as it marked the slyzard with so many shallow wounds. Her dance's brevity was more than compensated for by its intensity, and in those frantic seconds of battle, the scope of the world narrowed, excluding everything except her, her weapon, and the rampaging monster that chose to oppose her. The cavalry still fired their arrows, though much more cautiously. The slyzard screeched, rearing its head back as a telltale glow began to spread within its mouth. Lightning dashed forward as it released the long gout of flame, spraying its fire in a sweeping arc, abandoning any semblance of precision in order to finally scorch the troublesome pest that shocked its flesh and made it bleed from so many different places.

Not a patch of earth before the slyzard was safe, so Lightning abandoned the ground entirely. She vaulted upwards as the slyzard released its searing barrage, her arms finding delicate purchase around the beast's elongated neck. She hauled herself up and onto the monster's back, even as it cut short its torrent of fire to shriek its protest, frantically trying to dislodge her with a choppy battering of its wings.

She weathered its attempts to remove her, remaining unshaken and steady despite the slyzard's thrashing as she crept forward along its body to position herself better against its narrow, noticeably more vulnerable neck. The skin was thinner there, the gaps in its scaly armour more pronounced in order to accommodate the increased range of motion it required. When she plunged Blazefire into one of those gaps, burying it a quarter-blade deep into flesh, the slyzard screamed, and then panicked. It launched itself back into the air, wings beating erratically as it fought to climb into the sky, choppily rising above the treetops. Lightning channeled Blazefire's power, discharging electric surges into the slyzard's flesh and electrocuting it from the inside out as she forced the blade deeper into the monster's neck. It struggled, desperately careening through the air as it tried to shake her loose. Another push saw blazefire strike bone, and the slyzard released one final cry as its wings seized for a moment, then went slack, the slyzard's neck slumping down as the last of its fight left it - along with its ability to keep aloft in the sky.

Lightning was calm – relaxed even – as the slyzard's death throes brought them both crashing back down to earth, her scarf still trailing behind her, flapping violently in the wind. She repositioned herself against the falling body, ensuring it would provide the necessary buffer between her and the hard, unyielding ground below. The body impacted with tremendous force, and Lightning knew that if there had been any life left in the slyzard's electrified, bleeding body before the fall, there was certainly none now. Bone crunched sickeningly as the slyzard plowed into the earth, Lightning clinging to its back. She hadn't expected the body to twist. The slyzard's corpse rolled as it hit the earth, and Lightning was forced to throw herself clear lest the draconic body roll atop her and crush her. She hit the ground badly, rolling at an awful angle and knocking her head with enough force to momentarily blank her consciousness. She heard an awful snapping sound come from her back, and was briefly terrified by the prospect that she hadn't _felt_ it before she finally tumbled to a rest, dazed almost out of her mind. After a moment, the realized that all of her body ached enough to allay her worst fears, though she was still hard pressed to will herself to stand up. A bone deep exhaustion enveloped her, and slowly, the temptation to close her eyes, just for a fraction of a moment, overwhelmed her.

* * *

"I want to go to Eden."

Lightning frowned. There was something off about the way Serah seemed to shift from foot to foot, like she was impatient. She could see the strain in her eyes, the palpable sense of uncertainty belying the desperation lurking beneath her suggestion. More than anything, something was wrong with her smile. Some days, Lightning knew she'd lived for Serah's honest smiles, and there was nothing honest about the expression her sister was wearing now.

 _Serah… What's wrong, really? Be honest with me, please._

Lightning barely glanced up from her work. "Why would you ever want to go there?"

"I just want to," Serah said. Her eyes looked like they wanted to say so much more. "I'm tired of the desert. I want to see Eden's forests."

 _Why can't you trust me?_

Lightning scoffed. "There's nothing there worth seeing. It's a backwater mess of a kingdom that's due to collapse sooner or later. Don't waste your time."

"Claire…"

 _Ah, I hurt you didn't I?_

"You know I can't be called that anymore," Lightning snapped.

"Just because they gave you a name doesn't mean you have to kill the old one. This life is consuming you Claire. Let's just get away for a while."

 _You always were the smarter one._

Lightning slammed her hand on the table. "Consuming me? This is all for you Serah! This life is me trying to get back everything that was taken from you, and the only one who doesn't seem to appreciate that is you."

Serah looked away.

 _I guess it did consume me, in the end._

"How did you even plan on getting there?" Lightning demanded. "Or did you forget why this _life_ of mine was necessary in the first place?" She scoffed when her sister had no reply. "Of course. You need to wake up and face reality, Serah. Wake up."

* * *

She didn't come to slowly. Lightning's eyes snapped open, taking in her unfamiliar surroundings even as her hand shot out to seize in a vice grip whatever aggravating presence was continuing to shake her. She heard a pained hiss as her fingers clamped down on somebody's wrist.

"You uhh… want to let go there?" Rygdea asked through clenched teeth.

As her focus returned to her, Lightning quickly recognized her surroundings as the interior of a tent, and she relaxed slightly as she released her grip on the cavalry lieutenant's wrist.

"Sorry," she said quietly, as she watched him try to shake the feeling back into the limb.

"Oh don't you get apologetic on me now. I should be thanking you, is the right of it. You really pulled us out of the fire there with that stunt of yours. I'm not saying we couldn't have brought it down ourselves, but I'd be bringing a lot less soldiers home with me." He rubbed at his wrist. "Guess now I know how you managed to hold onto that damn thing. Gods girl, that's one hell of a grip."

Lightning only shrugged. "I'm glad casualties stayed –" she paused as she registered the absence of weight on her hip. Her eyes snapped to focus on Rygdea. "Where is my –"

"Your sword's on the crate just behind you," the officer reassured her. "Nifty thing, that. Gave quite a few people some nasty shocks when they went to pick it up. It's none the worse for the fall, unless the whole shocking business is something it shouldn't be doing. Can't say the same for your bow though. It was snapped clean in two when we found you."

Lightning thought back to that horrible cracking noise, and that terrifying moment when she'd thought it might have been her spine.

"That belonged to one of yours," Lightning said. Rygdea gave her a look. "I requisitioned it from one of your soldiers during the battle. He was a terrible shot."

Rygdea loosed a bark of laughter. "I doubt he'll mind. More than like he'll be telling the tale of how his bow was snapped in a battle with a dragon for the rest of his damned life."

Lightning scoffed. "Slyzard's are far from dragons. If we're being complimentary, they're a pale imitation."

"Like that's going to have any influence on their tales. Poor is the soldier who lets fact and logic interfere with a good warstory." He paused, considering something. "I have to say though, Lightning, you sound like you know more than a little about these nasty wyvern types. You some sort of expert?"

Lightning hesitated before replying, though Rygdea didn't seem to notice. "Draconids… interest me," she finally said. "Growing up I learned all I could about them."

"Why's that? He asked, curious.

Lightning let a soft smile show. "Who hasn't dreamt of flying?"

Rygdea only nodded. After a moment's time however, he burst into a fit of laughter that seemed to consume his entire body. "Well you definitely lived that dream today then, didn't you?" he said once he had slightly more control of himself. "Your landing skills could use more work though. That tumble at the end wasn't pretty. You must be made of sturdier stuff than most; it's a damned miracle you didn't snap half the bones in your body."

Lightning shrugged. "I did a few things to disperse the impact, and got a little lucky besides. Don't think too much of it."

"Heh, whatever you say." He shifted uncomfortably, looking for all the world like he had something to say, but no idea how to broach it.

"Lightning sighed. "Spit it out, Rygdea."

The soldier looked away for moment, before finally speaking his mind. "Listen Lightning. I don't know what you were doing out here – and I don't care, either," he amended when he saw the way Lightning's eyes narrowed. "But I meant what I said. This would've gone a lot worse if you hadn't intervened. The cavalry owes you, and I owe you. So if you need something, just let me know."

Lightning looked him over carefully, scouring his features for any hint of dishonesty. He only seemed earnest, though. If she wasn't still sore, she might have snickered. Though she couldn't claim to know the man well, she had gotten the sense that the man couldn't tell a lie if his life depended on it. It looked like that hadn't changed.

"Thanks," she finally said. "I appreciate it." She left it at that, omitting the rest of the thought running through her mind. _I expect I'll be taking you up on that sooner rather than later._ She glanced towards the entrance of the tent. "I should get back. I've been gone too long already."

"Well don't let me keep you." Rygdea stepped aside. "The cavalry will have your back, Lightning. Remember that."

"I will," Lightning assured him, as she brushed past the officer to duck through the narrow entrance of the tent. She paused as she stepped out, looking to offer a last piece of parting advice. "Keep watching the skies. Slyzards are solitary when they're not raising young, and they're fiercely territorial. This one would have been the only draconid in the area, but once others realize it's gone, don't be surprised if they seize the chance to move in."

Rygdea grimaced. "Well so long as they aren't knock off dragons from the discount store…"

It wasn't until the campsite was long departed and she was once more fully enveloped by the wilds of the Gapra that Lightning allowed herself a brief moment of quiet laughter.

* * *

 _That's the chapter! If you have anything to say about it please say so in a review - I try to reply to all of them. I'm also likely to release a brief flurry of ff14 oneshots that were written in my notebook while my keyboard was broke, in case that interests anybody. Feel free to follow my tumblr - I'm orderlyanarchist on there - for previews and new and updates and stuff._


End file.
